After some months, Yale and Wyba were already famous in Sword City; it was very unusual having a pair of brother and sister together at the Sword Five. Furthermore, rumors about Lar having some kind of special relationship with them had also spread quickly.
The fame wasn’t the only thing which increased, in those months thanks to her training with Lar, Wyba reached the expert stage in swordsmanship. With her age, no one doubted that she was the only one who deserved to be the member of the Sword Five representing the Mortal Rank even if she never battled in the Sword Arena due to her young age.
Lar had also improved a lot in Body Illusion although she had yet to master it; she lacked talent regarding illusion magic, but her perseverance and stubbornness were first class. Although Yale considered that she was too slow at learning it even with his guidance, her speed was considerably high compared to other kids who wanted to train such a complex skill.
On the surface, the one who had improved less in those months was Yale because he had yet to condensate Sword Qi although he felt that he was near to accomplish it.
However, the truth was just the opposite, Yale’s improvement in those months was monstrous. That was because Yale had developed some hidden training schedule that except him no one was aware of.
He had disguised himself to travel for the towns and forests near Sword City; those days he didn’t go to the Sword Arena and returned every day for his training session with Lar, but he reaped great benefits in those short travels.
The most important thing was that he finally managed to use Soul-search without any influence of his emotions. Of course, Yale didn’t know if in an extreme situation he would be able to avoid the influence of his emotions on the Soul-search, but at least in most situations, he was already in a perfect control of it.
In those travels, Yale had been hunting criminals with bounties and acting like a lone bounty hunter. Although the criminals didn’t dare to enter Sword City nor act towards them for fear, there were quite a few hiding in the nearby towns. Moreover, forests had always been a good place for criminals to hide.
Those criminals all turned into Yale’s experiment subjects for Soul-search and Poison Claw, which Yale completely mastered in those months. Of course, the criminals Yale targeted were only the ones he knew he could deal with, he didn’t dare to hunt those who surpassed him by a lot of power levels.
Besides that, Yale also reached the peak of the expert stage in Martial Arts and archery, both were in the same state as swordsmanship, only a step away from the master stage, but that step was still too difficult, and Yale didn’t even focus on it as he wanted to reach it first with swordsmanship.
In addition to that, Yale had also managed to increase Shape Shift to the twenty-sixth level, Stealth to the twenty-third level and Archery Senses to the twentieth level.
Moreover, although Yale wasn’t satisfied with his growth of power in those months, his increases were still remarkable compared to others.
“Name: Yale | Age: 15 | Origin Level: 23 |Origin Points: 2413/2413”
“Vitality: 2103 | Strength: 2156 | Agility: 2143 | Intelligence: 3000 | Wisdom: 3000 | Dexterity: 2032”
The members of the Sword Five had access to a lot of resources, and with the free Sword Points, they obtain each day, the quality of the resources for their training was comparable to some big clans, those big clans were second only to the noble clans, so the treatment could be considered excellent.
There were a lot of powers who invested resources in Sword City because when those famous swordsmen left the city, those powers would try to recruit them.
Of course, since a member of the Larken Clan had created Sword City, even the big clans didn’t dare to try to force anyone to join them despite investing resources on the city.
They were called big clans, and they could give an excellent amount of resources to their younger generation; they have influence and power, but their foundation couldn’t compare to the noble clans. A big clan trying to challenge a noble clan would only end with the destruction of the so-called big clan.
Although talent was important to practice and turn stronger, the mindset and resources were also important. With the system of Sword City, those with a better talent and perseverance were able to obtain a luxurious treatment that would let them use their potential without problems without the need of selling themselves to a big clan or some other influential power.
As there were a lot of investors in the city, the expenses of each one weren’t too great, and most of the resources were also concentrated on the Sword Five, avoiding the resources to disperse too much. As long a power was able to obtain a member of the Sword Five, those resources invested were repaid.
When training a young kid, it was difficult to know if the investment would be worth or not, investing in Sword City gave them a better success of investments than focusing themselves on training those members of the younger generation.
Of course, that only applied with those who were good in swordsmanship, to recruit people with other talents they needed to use the traditional methods and without a background like the Larken Clan, such type of city wouldn’t be able to exist.
Since most people in Sword City lacked background, the position as a member of the Sword Five was extremely important to them, and they would love to join any power after leaving, which was just what those powers wanted.
However, there were exceptions that provoked loses for them, like the current situation; three of the current members of the Sword Five hadn’t any intention to join anyone, so those resources invested would be wasted.
It was unavoidable that sometimes the talents didn’t want to join or they were noticed by the Larken Clan and taken away, but usually, at least those members would have a good impression of those powers who supported the system of the Sword Five in Sword City.
The Larken Clan didn’t control Sword City, but when they heard rumors of some super geniuses appearing it wasn’t strange that someone were to investigate; they loved to recruit sword geniuses no matter where they were and Sword City wasn’t an exception.
Of course, their standards were extremely high, most members of the Sword Five although they would be recruited if they wanted to join, they weren’t talented enough to make the Larken Clan move.
Those powers would just sigh when a genius was taken by the Larken Clan or left without joining anyone, as they at least contributed to them with their resources, and having a good relationship with the Larken Clan or with those geniuses who left on their own was always good. However, Yale didn’t even feel grateful for those resources as they were still worse than the food Aiwai cooked for him. For Yale, those were low-quality resources that were barely acceptable; there was no way he would felt indebted or grateful for them.
After all, the was no way any clan could have a chef of Aiwai’s cooking level every day with the best ingredients for all the members of the young generation. Such kind of treatment was strange even for the ultimate geniuses of the noble clans; they might obtain it for one or two days as a reward for accomplishments to the clan, but such treatment would be impossible to sustain every day.
Few people bothered on learning cooking to such levels, and those who did it wouldn’t cook for free. Thus, if there weren’t some deep affection between both parties, the situation that happened with Aiwai, Yale and Wyba wouldn’t happen to others.
That day, Yale was finally determined to reach the master stage on swordsmanship; he felt that with so little resources he would need to rely on the rewards of the system to increase his power and to continue with the sub-quests he needed to reach the master stage in swordsmanship.
Normal battles wouldn’t have any effect to Yale, so he had directly challenged Selenia in the Sword Arena. That challenge made the arena be bustling with people like in the first day Yale reached the city when Selenia Battled against Ralen.
Yale didn’t feel confident in his chances of winning that battle, Selenia was at the peak of the Practitioner Stage, more than a whole rank ahead of him who was just a 3-star Apprentice. Moreover, although Yale doubted Selenia was at the peak in her physical stats, there was no way she was weak like those fellows Yale had beaten before due to their lack of body training.
“Thank you for accepting my challenge.”
In the Sword Arena, Selenia Smiled after hearing Yale.
“I had also been wanting to test that weird sword style of yours.”