jmclarke
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Chapter 745: Studying the Blade
🕑 Added 2023-12-22 21:08:41 +0000 UTC“Are you sure you want to do this?” Bjorgrund asked, hefting his greataxe. The enormous weapon—built to be wielded by golem knights for crushing through the hardest, thickest armour—gleamed in the multi-hued light of the sanctum’s portals. “This isn’t how you normally fight, is it? And excuse me if that sounds insulting, but…”
The young giant flexed his muscular arms. “I’m scared that if I make a mistake, I could smash you into oblivion, or cut you in half, or rip you to shreds, or split you down the middle, or—”
“I think I get it,” Alex grunted through clenched teeth. “And you're right, this isn't the way I'm most comfortable fighting…actually, that's an understatement: I've never fought like this before.”
“So, why now? You're more of a spell-caster, right?” the giant looked at him in confusion.
Alex, the General of Thameland, looked at him evenly. “You're right, but a lot has changed lately. So, I have to adjust. I think it's more than time I explore all my options.”
He looked down at what was in his hand.
“And I do mean all my options.”
Holding swords wasn’t normal for Alex.
He’d learned how true that was on the Red Siren’s deck when he and Theresa were testing the Mark of the Fool’s limits. They’d been using one of Twinblade Lu’s swords and one of her hunting knives. Alex had swung both, testing when the Mark would punish him for disobeying one of Uldar’s no combat decrees.
With the knife, he was able to take a few swings right up until he and Theresa simulated a fight, then the Mark acted to stop him. From that, he’d learned that a knife was both a weapon and a tool, so the Mark had only punished him when he used it directly for combat.
A sword, though, had one purpose; it was a tool meant for conflict, whether that was sparring, or sword-fighting, even in self-defence: it wasn’t a tool meant for peeling carrots or potatoes, it was meant for fighting. When he’d held or carried Theresa's sword, the Mark had allowed him to do that, but when it came to swinging it, even once, the Mark’s interference had put a stop to that.
That was the last time he’d attempted to use a sword, he hadn’t even tried when he'd “inherited” one, knowing how futile that would have been.
But today he was ready to try again, using the very same one he’d received from Hannah, the one he was holding.
He was no sword expert, but he could tell that the Traveller’s sword was well balanced. Most of its weight was toward the weapon’s hilt, the blade was light and sharp. Its strikes wouldn’t have the heavier cutting power of the Twinblade, but it would slice cleanly and be manoeuvrable in the hand.
Magic radiated from it: Hannah had used the sword for hiding memories, and it still had plenty of enchantments left in it.
He recognized the pathways of mana coursing through it, allowing it to have precise cutting power, strength and flexibility.
What made the sleek blade most interesting to Alex, though, was how ‘conductive’ it was.
He could easily pass his mana through it, allowing him to conduct spells through the blade, and there was a remnant of the Traveller’s power remaining inside. There wasn't enough of her energy left for the sword to act on its own, but if he wanted to channel his own power through it…
‘I bet I could channel Hannah's power through it then use teleportation on anything it hits.’ He speculated. ‘Then, I’d be able to cut into something’s body, like a Ravener-spawn, and teleport the severed part away…’
He thought about his fight with the First Apostle at Uldar’s Rise, where he managed—through a combination of brute force and Hannah’s power—rip the man's arm off.
With this blade, he could turn that from a desperation move into a regular tool in his arsenal.
That thought excited—
“Uh, Alex?” Bjorgrund asked.
“Yeah?” The young wizard startled.
“You've been staring at that sword for about a minute now…do you still want to fight?” the young giant asked.
A bright, red blush washed over his cheeks, barely hidden by his scraggly beard. He found himself glad he hadn’t gotten around to that shave quite yet. “Yeah, geez, I've been wasting your time here. Alright, let's get started. Just…could you do me a favour?”
Bjorgrund smiled. “Of course: I know what you're going to say, already.”
Alex smiled back. “And what's that?”
“You're gonna ask me not to go easy on you: don’t worry, with a warrior of your abilities and experience? I'd never dream of going easy on you! Don't worry, ‘mighty General’. I'll give you all I got!”
Alex's smile quickly faded. “What, are you out of your mind? You're completely wrong! I've never used a sword before—for the love of all that is good in the world, go easy on me! I've got no interest in being smashed into oblivion, or being cut in half, or being ripped to shreds, or being split down the middle, or—”
“Alright, alright, you've made your point!” the young giant cried, falling into a fighting stance. “Let's get started.”
Alex, for his part, fell into the first stance of the Spear-and-Oar dance. “Let's go.”
And he charged, the blade held high.
The young wizard was quick, and an expert at dodging the attacks of some of the deadliest foes across the planes. He literally danced around the young giant’s strikes, avoiding them with ease.
Bjorgrund grunted, swinging his weapon with deceptive expertise, considering his youth, the axe blade passing inches from Alex's body.
The young giant was good, but Alex had dealt with foes as deadly as the demon Kaz-Mowang; especially, since Bjorgrund was holding back, he could dodge the giant’s blows all day.
But, this practice wasn't about dodging.
It was about testing new combat strategies…and Alex had never wielded a sword before.
Instinct and experience told him that he should be holding his staff, peppering Bjorgrund with distracting spells so his summoned monsters or one of his friends could strike at the giant with a finishing blow.
But, he was here alone, against the towering sparring partner, and the point of the entire exercise was to use his sword.
So, after spinning around one of Bjorgrund’s wide swings, Alex went for a strike with the flat of the blade, copying a move he'd seen Theresa use more times than he could count.
It was a disaster.
His perfected dance turned into a confused rush as he tried to club the young rune-marked in a move he’d never used before.
Bjorgrund easily backhanded him before he could make it into the young giant’s reach.
It felt like an avalanche had struck; the young wizard launched off his feet, soaring through the air, slamming to the sanctum floor.
“Urrrhuhhhuhhhraaaaargh,” he gurgled.
“Oh no! Are you all right?” Bjorgrund cried, bounding over to him.
“I'm fffineee.” Alex drooled on the floor. “Just trying to put my skeleton back in my body.”
“Sorry, I swung a little hard!” the giant apologised. “You were dodging so much, then you tried that clumsy rush, and I thought it was just a feint, and you’d counter me!”
“Ugh, so it’s not enough for you to break my body, you also have to break my spirit too…” Alex wheezed.
“No, it's not like that, I—”
“I’m joking.”
With a groan, Alex pushed himself off the floor, muttering Mana to Life. His practice with tonality and body language was already making the spell work much faster. He could feel his bruises healing.
“You're feeling better?” the giant asked. “Casting that spell seems easier for you now.”
“Much easier,” Alex agreed. “And thank you by the way.”
“I'm just saying what I see: you're a lot faster—”
“No, no, I don't mean for complimenting me—I mean for smashing me like that.” Alex cracked his neck.
“Uh…okay?” The young giant looked confused again.
“You've given me a baseline: very important in experimentation,” the young wizard stretched. “Now I know exactly how well I'll do when it comes to using a sword before I apply my new Mark. Time to see how fast I improve. Give me a second.”
He thought about the previous exchange with the giant, and focused the Mark of the General on the task of infusing his knowledge of different dances into swordplay. He also had it draw on his experience with cooking and his knowledge of anatomy, focusing on using them to improve his strikes.
Dozens of successes and failures flowed into his mind, neatly ordered, showing him how the movements of dance could be used aggressively, how the edge alignment and knife-play of butchering meat could apply to his cuts with a sword, and how his knowledge on anatomy could teach him where to strike with the Traveller’s blade.
Alex smiled. “This is going to be interesting. And—”
He paused, feeling waves of emotion washing over him.
What was that? He felt concern, irritation, annoyance…and also, envy? He looked at the floor where he’d placed the spell guides, and his other gear…including the aeld staff.
It was leaning against the wall, its crystal blooms, blazing. Alex could feel jealousy, all aimed at the sword in his hand.
He grinned sheepishly at the aeld. “Don't worry, I'm not going to set you aside for a new weapon. I'm just practising with this to open my options.”
If a staff could go ‘hmph', his staff would have ‘hmphed’.
Bjorgrund looked at Alex sidelong, his eyes darting between the young wizard and the staff. “Are you talking to that piece of wood?”
“Yes,” Alex said simply.
“Uh…does it respond?”
“In a way.” the young wizard fell back into a stance of the Spear-and-Oar dance.
“Uh, maybe we should take a break…” The giant lifted his axe again. “Maybe you've been working too hard, it sounds like your mind—Oh shit!”
The young wizard charged, using the Mark of the General.
Their exchange was far less disastrous this time.
The Mark constantly guided Alex’s body, drawing on his experiences in dance, cooking and anatomy, weaving them into his and Bjorgrund’s battle. At first, the young wizard only dodged the giant’s strikes, calling on the Mark to use his knowledge of body language to learn Bjorgrund’s patterns when he fought.
Dodging the giant grew easier as his subtle tells were revealed during their fight.
Soon, the General found openings in his fighting style.
Calling on the Mark, Alex darted back in for a strike.
The Giant’s eyes widened.
Where Alex’s rush was a clumsy copy of one of Theresa’s deadly strikes before, now it was unique: a fusion of a strike from the Spear-and-Oar dance—and the aggressive movements of many other dances—and the wizard’s powerful body flowed through the giant’s guard.
Years of cooking—splitting meat and vegetables—guided his arm, joining with a swing of his body weight from the dances.
Anatomy books whispered the target to him: a nerve running through the giant’s torso.
The flat of the blade struck home with a loud slap.
“Argh!” Bjorgrund recoiled, stumbling back in surprise. “What in—how did…ow!” He rubbed his side, looking down at it. “Felt like you cut me there, did you really use the flat?”
“Yeah,” Alex said, smiling. “I really did.”
“What in the names of all my ancestors, you moved differently!” Alex’s sparring partner cried. “The first time you struck at me, you were like a drunk, clumsy animal, it was easy to hit you. Now… It was completely different, like you’d become a different fighter!”
Now the wizard outright beamed. “Did I really do that much better?”
“I'll say…and you wanted me to go easy on you!” Bjorgrund huffed. “Were you holding back?”
“No, the Mark just helped me improve really fast. I think you'll have to hold back less now.” Alex grinned.
Now Bjorgrund grinned back. His rune flashed in the middle of his chest. “Now we've got us a fight! I hope you'll let me come at you with full strength, this is fun!”
“Yeah, I can see why Theresa likes it so much…though it definitely isn't my preferred way of fighting…but still, it is fun.”
“Oh yeah! So, we go again?” Bjorgrund asked.
“You know it.”
Lifting their weapons, the wizard and rune-marked charged forward.
###
Author's Note
Hello thirty-six cool fools, almighty chosen, wise sages, and mighty champions! Thank you for your support!
Deleted scene:
"While you were tracking me, hidden church, I was studying the blade!" Alex said, before cringing himself to death.
Lmao, cya tomorrow!
Comments
Nathan moi
I wonder if he can learn from opponents, the fact that he learned silent casting from another let me guess the answer is a yes so let's hope he will fight Hart and learn from his mark of the champion... Also i'm pretty sure Theresa is going to love sparing with him and her swordsmanship will soar to the heavens with Alex help
lenkite
Did he really decide that swinging a piece of metal is the best way to defeat the First Apostle ? Wow man, class change from [Summoner] to [Spellsword] initiated because he can now swing a pointed stick ! Magic is boring now, lol !
Evander
Who is first before their God now? Is it the Saint or the General?
Signspace
I feel like understanding what you have to work with is a pretty core part of command? And what was that saying, "understand *yourself*, understand the enemy, win 10000 battles" it's pretty clear cut what he is doing.
Joseph Thibodeau
He'd be like Gandalf!
Alex
I think he wants to ambush the first apostle
Evander
I feel like his time would be better spent learning proper attack magic. The sword is nice, but he will not match the first apostle with it. With magic, he might. Especially if he's disintegrating people and summoning allies built for war.
MockingBird
Why isn't Alex training in Generasi, or fortifying the sanctum, and bringing in his other allies? He could teleport them in and have them set it up as an outpost that's actually guarded. I get that he's excited about using the mark, but this seems shortsighted. He's the general, the commander, you'd think he'd know better then to do this solo. He's able to teleport, and communicate via Claygon, it wouldn't take that long to form a plan and bring people over, etc. He's honestly making the upcoming fight harder then it needs to be.
Andrea Calcagno
Imho while some people have rightfully pointed out the lack of logic in Alex's training alone in the sanctum, and that he should train in Generasi to have either better results or more people to empower, I believe we have missed another point entirely. Don't pull off a Gojou Satoru moment and uber-nerf the protagonists. Imho we are going to see an epic eventful fight while this should be an absolute curb stomp of the apostles. The lack of logic here is in why Alex isn't turning the sanctum into an impenetrable, heavily staffed, heavily trapped fortress. He has free roam between the sanctum and all his other resources, he has a plethora of allies, he has the heroes to coordinate and train with, summons, golems, professors specialized in setting up runes, wards and the like, and he is there swinging a sword and saying "This, this will help". I believe in your plot twists and big moments, but please don't make this fight difficult by having him not use even a quarter of what is at his disposal.
MinE
If it includes any varient of the title the Fool, the stalker will probably have to search Alex Roth, Alex Roth of Thameland, or Alex Roth of Thameland and the city of magic.
Page
He should somehow join blade and staff into a sword staff or glaive. Then the spear-and-oar dance has something to work with.
Lorevi Q
Honestly he should head back to generasi at this point to practice with the watchers or his teachers. There's no real reason to hang around keldas sactum anymore since he can come back at any time
IFL
One step at a time, he needs to remember some conversations about those topics first.
just_a_guy
Now THIS should have been the first chapter after the Mark was fixed! Condense the flashback chapters into a couple short quotes interspersed within this chapter to have Alex reflect (very briefly) and learn DURING his fight, instead of spend two chapters reflecting before his fight. I’m excited for more of this! Although many people (myself included) were frustrated with the endless flashbacks, I knew we’d be back on track eventually. This is a great story, written well, and it was always going to settle back in eventually.
ZCochraine!%
I wonder if he can learn to lucid dream, cone he is actually immortal and so supremely skilled that he can enjoy the luxury of normal sleep, I wonder what he could do with dreams.
Kettle
@Nugito, it didn’t occur to me how much easier a unique name would be to track. My thought was that the specific name he is tracking is no longer valid. So he could lose his connection to it. That could manifest as either “huh, weird” or “did the quarry die?”.
Jordan Jones
Eventually, yes. But practicing the fundamentals, mastering the basics, is critically important. If he learned that way from the ground up he’d cripple his fighting style if he had to fight under another interdiction. He should learn to fight with as much skill as possible without magic, and afterwards, learn how to combine his two fighting styles into a wholistic third, I think.
Josh
I was thinking giant Mana blade with the staff as the handle
Tim B.
Man I can't wait to see how fast he would advance with his mark working on it too. Now that the Fool is gone it is time for him to go super OP in my book. Destroy all his enemies then love happily ever after.
Code Reed
My thoughts exactly. There really isn't any reason he shouldn't do it. Aside from the obvious benefits, he'll need to sleep a lot less and he only sleeps like 2 hours a night. Can you imagine sleeping 15 minutes a day and being totally cool? That would be awesome.
nugitoBambino
maybe? like i bet he can see all the 'alex roths' around and even though the name might not totally be unique (like 'alex roth fool of thameland') it's very possible he's the only one in the given areas they're looking for. that's just a guess though
Julien Fellegara
Hey, he should try the divine. And he should also do some life cultivation 😶
Jayson Legott
Loving these chapters! Thanks! Though Alex your thinking is too shortsighted. Why one or the other? Combine both blade and staff one hand you wield the blade and the other the staff. With a little bit of practice you’ll be a proper blade mage
Tim B.
I've always wanted to see more of how it works in this universe too
Tim B.
I can't wait until he does cultivation now that he isn't banned from divinity. With how he has already modified his body it is gonna get nuts.
Decide
Okay, Alex. Is going to level up really fast with the sword. Good. Now, after this he’s probably going to try actually cultivating. He’ll probably use Mana to Life at the same time and level up quicker, and then figure out how to cultivate while walking around. Still waiting on that combat magic, though I’m sure it’ll be stupidly easy, barely an inconvenience.
TFTC
Matt Cheek
Does the stalker not know his name is Alex Roth?
Obi-Wan-Sage
Don't quote me on it. But i believe he still can be tracked because the tracker knows his name. The tracker uses the persons name!!
Obi-Wan-Sage
So glad the Spear-and-Oar dance is gonna become deadly now!!! Thank you for the chapter!!!
George R
Thanks for the chapter loved the interaction between Alex and Bjorgrund
Kettle
Question: Since Alex’s title changed, can he still be tracked? Sandy Claws specifically used his title when calling out his name.
Extrobuartem Buttpanzy
I *so* want that deleted scene to happen when he fights the hidden church again (except for the death part). It would be funny.
David Deden
Thanks for the chapter! What does the Christmas schedule look like?
First
