Chapter 6: Sword Training
***
The back garden of the church, calling it a "back garden" was being generous. It was really just a large stretch of wasteland. The flower fields that once grew there had long since withered, though traces of their former beauty and grandeur could still be glimpsed among the remnants.
Walking to the center of the back garden, Isha did not draw the longsword at her hip. Instead, she picked up a straight wooden stick from the ground nearby, gave it a couple of casual swings through the air, then nodded to herself with satisfaction.
"My swordsmanship carries too much killing intent. I won't fight you with a real blade."
Su Ling had no objection to this. After all, having been doused in cold water by Lu on multiple occasions, she had developed a fairly clear picture of her own current abilities. She knew that even with a wooden stick in hand, Isha could probably string her up and beat the daylights out of her.
Without any hesitation, she drew her sword. If you ignored the rust along the blade, Lu was without question an exceptionally beautiful sword. The blade was straight and slender, slightly longer than a standard longsword, and the intricate, exquisite engravings on the guard added an indescribable air of mystery.
The blood-red inscription along the blade was even more eerie. In a world with a cultivation or xianxia setting, the first impression this sword would give anyone would almost certainly be that of an evil sword, a demon blade, though Su Ling herself didn't feel particularly bothered by that. Evil sword or spirit sword, as long as it didn't work against her, she was fine with it.
And Su Ling had a feeling that the real reason the World Tree had dropped her into this world was precisely because of this sword. After all, when she first made contact with Lu, the reward that should only have been distributed after a quest was fully completed had arrived ahead of schedule.
As for the mismatch between world difficulty and quest difficulty, that felt more like something forced to fit a specific purpose. Being sent to do a single-digit difficulty quest in a world ranging from Lv31 to Lv59 was, no matter how she looked at it, weirdly out of place.
She let her fingertips graze along the blade, and an indescribable sense of resonance fed back into her. She felt as though the sword in her hand was an extension of her own body, she could even feel the breeze brushing against the edge of the blade.
Not far away, Lu watched Su Ling's back in silence. Sentient swords were not rare in this world, and between a sword and its master there existed something called resonance, or compatibility.
If compatibility was too low, not only would the sword's power be impossible to draw out, it would cause harm to both parties. For this reason, sentient weapons often sought out a master they were satisfied with on their own. Of course, some preferred to roam free, and that type of weapon would typically enslave a large number of sword slaves to use as disposable pawns.
As for compatibility itself, aside from something as transcendent as the World Tree which could quantify it directly as a number, the normal way to gauge it was simply to see whether the master experienced a clear resonance upon touching the sword. Su Ling's current reaction left no room for doubt, her compatibility with Lu was remarkably high.
And as it turned out, that was exactly the case.
【Immortal-Slaying Sword】
Origin: Second Compound Forbidden Curse Magic Circle
Quality: White
Type: One-Handed Sword
Durability: ∞ (Indestructible)
Attack Power: 13~21
Equipment Requirement: Silver Dragon
Weapon Resonance: 80%
Sword of Slaughter Effect 1: Sharpness +1
Sword of Slaughter Effect 2: Bloodthirsty Demon Blade (Passive) — for every enemy killed while wielding the Immortal-Slaying Sword, permanently gain 1~10 Sharpness based on the enemy's strength.
Description: A Sword of Slaughter forged by a supreme compound magic circle so powerful even the gods trembled before it. As wild and unruly as she is, how could she ever be content to become a weapon in just anyone's hands? Unless, of course, you are the Silver Dragon.
Price: Cannot be traded.
......
Seeing Lu's new sword name, Su Ling felt a wave of speechlessness wash over her. She didn't turn around to look at Lu, only asked inwardly: "You changed the name yourself?"
"I did." Lu's tone was as flat as ever, as though she were commenting on something completely unremarkable. "Slaying gods, striking down immortals, the name suits me perfectly."
"You didn't go through all the novels and anime and stuff stored in my memories and read through all of them, did you?"
"I did, actually. Some of them were pretty interesting."
Smack. Su Ling raised her left hand and covered her eyes. She couldn't even be bothered trying to comprehend Lu's incomprehensible reading speed anymore. All she knew was that her hobbies and personal preferences were now, in all likelihood, fully known to Lu.
She didn't even need to clear her browser history before dying anymore, because clearing it wouldn't do any good. Everything Lu should and shouldn't know, Lu already knew. The whole concept of keeping a clean image in front of others? In front of Lu, that ship had sailed long ago.
From now on, she probably couldn't even put on the act of being a respectable, upstanding person.
"Whatever. What's this Weapon Resonance thing? How does 80% rank? Is it high or low?" After taking a moment to collect herself, Su Ling decided to face reality later and deployed the classic topic-change technique.
She would leave the embarrassment and distress to her future self. Her present self was going to run away from it first. As the saying goes, running away is shameful, but it works. That was exactly the situation here.
"Your starting point is where most people end up."
"Okay, that's reassuring."
With that settled, Su Ling gave the sword a few more practice swings, then faced Isha and settled into a very textbook-perfect opening stance, which left Isha staring at her with a slightly blank expression.
Though thinking about it, Su Ling was a complete beginner who had only just started learning swordsmanship, so Isha let it go. She herself had never used any kind of opening stance since she first picked up a sword, but maybe that style just didn't work for her, and maybe it did work for Su Ling?
"Come."
Isha stayed where she was, her hand holding the wooden stick hanging loosely at her side. The moment the word left her lips, Su Ling's eyes sharpened, and within just a few breaths she had closed the gap and was right in front of Isha!
Her longsword shot through the air straight at Isha's throat, fast, precise, and ruthless. But in Isha's eyes, the attack was riddled with openings. She didn't even dodge. She simply raised the wooden stick and tapped the middle of the blade with pinpoint accuracy, and the massive force threw Su Ling off balance.
The sword shifted along with her body. The tip grazed past Isha's neck by the thinnest of margins, close enough to shear off a few strands of hair, but not close enough to do anything more.
Immediately after, Isha swung the stick again and struck the hand Su Ling was using to hold the sword. The sudden pain made Su Ling instinctively loosen her grip, and then, completely beyond her control, tears welled up and spilled from her golden eyes.
Su Ling was baffled. Not because the sword had been knocked away, but because she was crying and she couldn't stop it. Setting aside the fact that even as a guy, she had endured two bouts of gut-wrenching, bone-deep agony without shedding a single tear, even right now, she had absolutely no urge to cry whatsoever.
It felt as though her tear ducts were an organ that existed independently from the rest of her body. Still attached to her, yes, but completely outside of her control, with "pain" as the switch that set them off.
"What's going on?" Su Ling frowned slightly, quickly wiped the tears from her face, picked up the sword, and asked herself the question.
"Probably the Silver Dragon Gene." Lu could naturally hear Su Ling's inner question, and she provided an answer.
As Su Ling stepped back to reestablish her distance from Isha, she continued the conversation in her mind: "Silver Dragon Gene? How so?"
"Dragon-kind are synonymous with tough, thick skin all around, but that one was an exception. She was very sensitive to pain. Even the slightest bit of pain could make her cry like her heart was breaking. And because of that, she..."
"Put all her stats into defense?"
"She became the most graceful, fastest Sword Saint in the world."
"?"
"What's there to be confused about? No matter how high your defense is, you're still going to get hit. But if you're fast enough, the enemy's attacks can never reach you, and an attack that never connects, no matter how painful it would be, is completely meaningless."
It felt like there was something slightly off about that logic, but Su Ling had to admit that what Lu said kind of made sense. However, she quickly realized there was another very serious issue.
The Silver Dragon Sword Saint that Lu was describing could move so fast that enemies couldn't touch her at all, but Su Ling was not her. Right now, Su Ling was a complete newbie, nothing more. Just because that Sword Saint could dodge didn't mean Su Ling could too. Didn't that mean she was going to be crying her way through every single fight?
That was way too embarrassing for words!!
"Let's start with your first problem, which is also your most serious one." Isha had no idea about the exchange between Su Ling and Lu. As Su Ling's temporary sword instructor, she had no intention of going through the motions, she was going to give proper, responsible guidance.
Her voice pulled Su Ling back to the present. That serious, focused expression of hers made Su Ling feel like she'd been transported back to high school, sitting in class actually paying attention to the teacher.
"A swordsman's sword is both their dignity and their life. The moment your sword leaves your hand, you're not far from death. So no matter what, you must never let go of your sword, unless you are absolutely confident you can get it back."
Su Ling gave a serious nod. Leaving aside the tear ducts that acted on their own, letting go of the sword had been a pure reflex reaction on her part, and the moment it happened, she had already recognized that it was a problem.
"Your swordsmanship itself just needs practice, that improves with repetition. I'll feed you moves next, come again." Isha continued.
"Got it."
At those words, Su Ling charged forward again with her sword, still aiming straight for a vital point. She knew there was no way she could actually hurt Isha, and as the one being trained, if she held back, the training would lose all meaning.
"Imagine there's a pair of wings behind your back. Then beat them down, hard."
Lu's voice sounded in her ear. Su Ling chased after that sensation, following her words, and in that instant, the wind rushing at her face seemed to slow just a little. Then a pair of dragon wings, nearly 5 times her body size, suddenly unfurled behind her back!
The dragon wings beat down hard. Su Ling's speed shot up by more than double, she became almost like a bolt of silver lightning. And the enormous wings that had blotted out the sky disappeared the moment her speed burst forward.
The shift was so sudden that even Isha's pupils involuntarily contracted a little. In the moment the dragon wings spread open, Su Ling looked like a true giant dragon, jaws open wide, fangs bared.
But the surprise lasted only a moment. Faced with Su Ling's fierce charge, Isha simply twisted her body and deflected the incoming thrust with a casual flick.
There was no way Su Ling was going to fall for the same move twice, though. She immediately steadied her footing, switched from a thrust to a slash, and the instant Isha blocked the blade with the wooden stick, she lifted her leg and drove a straight kick toward Isha's midsection!
"Too rushed. You two haven't entered a grappling exchange yet, she hasn't been pinned down by you."
As if to confirm Lu's words, Isha angled the wooden stick to the side, and the longsword immediately slid down along it. At the same time, Su Ling's body pitched forward from the momentum of the kick, and she ended up doing a full split on the spot.
Isha didn't let the opening go to waste either. She raised her hand and brought it down on Su Ling's sword hand, and this time, although tears still spilled from Su Ling's eyes, she did not let go of the longsword. She held on with a death grip.
The bad news was that she still couldn't control the tears. The good news was that the tears didn't blur her vision. Other than her cheeks feeling a little wet, there were no other negative effects.
"Keep going, just like that."
Isha gave a satisfied nod and gestured for Su Ling to keep attacking. Su Ling didn't make a fuss about it, she planted her left hand on the ground, pushed herself up, and drove her longsword straight at Isha's heart.
It had to be said that Su Ling's attack patterns were brutally direct. Either the heart or the throat, she was almost exclusively targeting vital points. Isha didn't think anything was wrong with that. In her view, combat was life and death. If you didn't go for your enemy's vitals, then in the end, the one who might die could be you.
In a fight, mercy was the one thing you didn't need.
Su Ling and Isha continued to exchange blows, with Lu occasionally chiming in on the side to give Su Ling a pointer or a reminder. In the midst of getting hit repeatedly, Su Ling's progress was nothing short of remarkable. By the time Isha called a stop, Su Ling had already grasped over 80% of the sword knowledge that Sword Mastery had given her.
As for the crying? Su Ling had gotten used to it. She treated it like her eyes had a built-in water pump. Anyway, crying was just crying, it didn't obstruct her vision, it didn't make her eyes uncomfortable. If it was going to flow, then let it flow.
"Your progress is incredibly fast. You might actually have more sword talent than even me." Isha pulled Su Ling up from the ground and said with genuine admiration.
Su Ling, however, didn't quite see it that way. She had never practiced swordsmanship before in her life, what she had came from Sword Mastery. The rapid progress was simply because she had 2 teachers guiding her.
Isha handled blocking and feeding her moves, personally demonstrating what response was appropriate for each type of attack. Lu used words to teach her the counters to those responses. With that back-and-forth going, it would have been strange if she hadn't improved quickly.
"Talent has nothing to do with it. Any pig would make the same rapid progress with a teaching method like this. Stop flattering me." She didn't know if it was because Lu had been pouring cold water on her for so long, but when faced with Isha's praise, Su Ling chose to pour a bucket of cold water on herself instead.
Hearing that, Isha's expression shifted into something a little odd, but she didn't say anything more, and simply helped brush the dust off Su Ling's clothes.
"Go take a bath when we get back. Then I'll put some medicine on you."
Medicine? Su Ling looked down at herself. She'd been focused on training the whole time and hadn't really paid attention, but now that she looked, she was a complete mess. Every patch of visible skin was either black or blue, and the hand she'd been gripping the sword with was even swollen a size bigger.
No wonder the water pump still hadn't shut off even after training ended. Now that the adrenaline was fading, the delayed pain hit and made her hiss through her teeth. Honestly, Isha hadn't held back even a little. Even with Su Ling's constitution being in a completely different league from before, she had still been beaten black and blue all over.
Of course, it wasn't to the point of split skin and exposed flesh. A bath and some medicine, and a night's sleep should sort her out by 70 or 80 percent. That said, Su Ling's constitution, now fused with the Silver Dragon Gene, was simply on a different level than before.
She put her coat back on and followed Isha back into the church. The 2 of them made their way up to the second floor and back to the bedroom, where Isha picked up a glass and poured Su Ling a cup of cold boiled water.
"Rest for a bit. I'll take you to the bathroom in a moment." Isha handed Su Ling the cup and said.
Su Ling didn't stand on ceremony. She had burned through quite a bit of stamina that night and was genuinely thirsty. She didn't down it all in one go, instead she sipped it slowly, little by little. That way, she could relieve the thirst more effectively, rather than having a stomach full of water while still feeling like she hadn't drunk enough.
And it was during this time of drinking water that Su Ling suddenly remembered something else that was very important. This church seemed to only have Isha's bedroom as a livable space, so once she finished her bath and got her medicine applied... where exactly was she going to sleep?
On the bench downstairs?