NOVEL NEXT Chapter 39: Change
A Saturday in early May.
Elus, the capital of the Holy Kingdom Seraheim.
Someone had come to see the Holy Law Official who was in charge of managing holy relics. It was Dersel Mishers, the captain of the 2nd Holy Knights Order who assisted the Saint. He looked at a certain priest in front of him and scrunched up his face.
"You can't find the whereabouts of the holy relic? What do you mean by that?"
"Just what I said. We can't detect it at all."
A woman with crimson hair tied up to one side.
It was Riena Ledophin, a high priest of the Holy Law Officials.
"This is just my guess, but I think it's one of two things."
Riena adjusted her large horn-rimmed glasses.
She spread two fingers with a bright smile.
"One is that it lost its divine power long ago. If you look at the records here, the last time it was confirmed was already 20 years ago, so unless it's a pretty remarkable holy relic, it would have lost its power and just become a chunk of scrap metal."
Riena thrust an old tome at Dersel. Dersel frowned at the distinctive smell coming from the old book.
"But the Eyes of the Moon is..."
"Yes, it's one of the five great holy relics. That's why I thought this option was a bit unlikely too."
Finishing her words, Riena tossed the book behind her.
Well, if you think it's unlikely, why even mention it? Dersel slightly narrowed his brow and opened his mouth.
"What's your other guess?"
"That it's fulfilling its assigned duty."
"What do you mean..."
"The Eyes of the Moon has the power to suppress unholy forces. According to the records, when the Eyes of the Moon is performing its original duty, it doesn't emit divine power."
Holding out a new book, Riena continued again.
"I wonder if there's something in Count Arcdute's territory? Something so unholy that the Eyes of the Moon is using all its power to stop it..."
Riena's eyes flashed coldly.
But Dersel immediately shook his head.
"That can't be it. If that were the case, the Saint would have noticed."
"Ahaha, of course, right?"
Riena laughed awkwardly.
Shortly after, worry settled on her face.
"Then what do we do? If we can't find the Eyes of the Moon..."
The Saint would hold them accountable.
His role was to lead the delegation and confirm the holy relics in each religious order. Remembering this, Dersel bit his lip slightly.
Then, a familiar voice reached both their ears.
"That doesn't matter."
A young man wearing pure white holy robes.
It was the Saint himself.
With each step he took, his sky-blue hair swayed gently. Seeing him, Dersel immediately stood up and bowed his head.
"What's important is that the Eyes of the Moon disappeared from Count Arcdute's territory."
The Saint raised his hand to acknowledge Dersel's greeting.
That's when Dersel's gaze turned to the Saint's hand.
What he held was a sheet of paper. At a glance, it looked like a permit. The Holy Kingdom's seal was stamped at the bottom of the paper.
"Saint, what you're holding..."
"His Holiness has spoken."
The Saint cut off Dersel's words.
His dry expression twisted slightly.
"He promises maximum support until we find the Eyes of the Moon."
"...!"
Dersel and Riena's eyes went wide.
The Saint looked at their reactions as if enjoying them and opened his mouth.
"Dersel, assemble the knight orders."
With those words, he handed over the permit. What was written there was support for three knight orders until the Eyes of the Moon was found.
As surprise filled Dersel's eyes, the Saint spoke in a smiling voice.
"We're going to Count Arcdute's territory."
***
While the Holy Knights were busy preparing to march out.
The Eyes of the Moon that the Holy Kingdom was so desperately searching for was swaying back and forth under the hot sun.
"Huff, huff!"
Silvan was breathing heavily as he ran hard around the training ground. It was already over twenty laps, but he showed no signs of stopping. His stamina was improving much faster than expected.
Ferda stared at Silvan's status window.
=====
[Name]: Silvan Arcdute
[Level]: 10
[Talent]: Necromancy - Mythical Grade
[Strength]: 20/20 [Stamina]: 26/26
[Agility]: 31/31 [Magic Power]: 1,321/1,321
[Charm]: 95/99 [Luck]: 65/75
[Affection]: 89
-Language comprehension is shared.
-Stat growth rates are shared.
*The higher the affection rating, the better the educational effects.
=====
His level had barely changed, but his stamina, strength, and agility stats had risen slightly. And maybe because he'd fed him all the remaining Death Herb, his magic power had increased considerably too.
Most surprising of all was the change in affection.
In that short time, it had risen by more than double. Along with the affection rating breaking through 80, a new benefit was added. The ability to share stat growth rates—and this was more overpowered than expected.
'When my stats go up, Silvan's stats go up too.'
Whether it was leveling up, training, or drinking elixirs, whenever Ferda's stats increased, Silvan's stats would increase too. Of course, since their levels and stats were different, it wasn't a one-to-one ratio, but it was definitely an incredible ability.
Since it worked in reverse too, he could think of it this way:
'If we level up together...'
The stat growth rate would double.
A satisfied smile formed on Ferda's lips.
Shortly after, his eyes narrowed as he looked at Silvan.
'About three weeks left now.'
At the end of May, a messenger would come from Serneck Forest.
To pick him up for Silvan's coming-of-age ceremony. Once they followed the messenger and arrived at the forest, that's when the main story of "The Savior" would begin. From there, Silvan Arcdute would experience hardships and crises and grow.
'...And.'
Most importantly, the most crucial event would occur.
Ferda Inosid's death. Throughout the past seasons, Ferda had always met his death in Serneck Forest. Of course, it was a necessary exit for the protagonist's growth, but this time he absolutely refused.
'No need to worry.'
Silvan had awakened as a necromancer faster than in any other season.
And Ferda had also regained his original rank. He wouldn't go down easily. Ferda clenched his fist and steeled his resolve.
That's when it happened.
<Think about it carefully. There are lots of benefits to making a contract with me, you know?>
A familiar voice came from somewhere.
It was Prang, the sword spirit dwelling in Arcane's dagger.
<First, you don't need to maintain it. It won't get dull or rust. In exchange, you just need to periodically supply a small amount of magic power and that's enough.>
Prang kept appealing his usefulness.
<Plus, look how tough it becomes! What was it again? Right, Sword Masters! It becomes durable enough not to break even when fighting those guys. If you make a contract now, you can get all these benefits. How about it? Tempting? Huh huh?>
If nothing else, this was pretty tempting.
Ferda, who had been keeping his mouth shut, suddenly spoke up.
"Wouldn't it be the same if I made a contract with any other sword spirit?"
<Hehe, you really know one thing but not two!>
Prang laughed ominously.
<Sword spirits aren't that common. Including me, there aren't even ten of us! Do you understand how rare an existence I am?>
That was definitely surprising. Less than ten of these things in existence.
Meanwhile, Silvan stopped in place. It looked like he'd completed his target amount.
"Be quiet for now. Let's talk about it later."
After tapping Prang a couple times, he picked up a towel and water pouch and stood up.
Then he approached Silvan and spoke to him.
"Good work."
A water pouch filled with ice.
After gulping down the water, Silvan soon showed a pleased smile.
"Well done. Now you can run well without taking breaks."
"Yeah. I practiced really hard."
"Wasn't it tough?"
"It was a bit tough at first, but now it's fine..."
Silvan, who was continuing to speak, twitched his eyebrows.
Looking at Ferda's expression, a sense of unease suddenly struck him.
"W-wait a minute!"
Silvan shouted urgently.
Then he corrected what he'd just said.
"Now that I think about it, it does seem a little tough. No, it's tough. I feel like my shoulders are going to fall off, and look at this. My legs are swollen too, right? So I think right now is just perfect."
Silvan suddenly started making weak sounds.
Watching this, Ferda chuckled. He could clearly see what Silvan's intention was. Well, he should meet those expectations. While looking around, he spotted something that looked decent.
A moderately thick and heavy-looking tree.
Ferda tapped the tree trunk and opened his mouth.
"Starting tomorrow, let's try running while dragging logs."
"How am I supposed to do that!?"
"It's fine. I've had other kids do it before and they did well."
Ferda grinned evilly, remembering his Hunter Academy days.
It was a smile that felt wicked. Silvan grumbled that he shouldn't have said anything.
<That kid is amazing every time I see him.>
Meanwhile, Prang muttered to himself.
<A mythical rank. I never thought such a thing really existed.>
When Prang first saw Silvan, he was so startled he screamed in terror. His head rang so much that he had to shut himself away in his room for three days. But now he seemed quite used to it, as he didn't scream.
He just grumbled to himself like now.
<In the old days, I would have wanted to make a contract with that kid, but not now. My instincts as a sword spirit are whispering that way.>
Though somewhat chatty, his instincts seemed quite useful.
Since Silvan had absolutely no talent for swordsmanship.
While Ferda was quietly listening to Prang's chatter, Silvan calmly looked up at the empty air.
[My king.]
It was because the spirits had appeared.
Hardy, Squishy, and Spiky circled around him and whispered.
[The ominous smell has disappeared.]
[You can rest easy now.]
The three spirits had been going on about an ominous smell since last week. Saying the smell was getting closer, that it might have a bad influence on Silvan, making all kinds of fuss.
But now the smell had disappeared, so they said he could relax. Silvan felt curious and asked a question.
"What was the identity of the smell?"
[It was a wolf pup burning with revenge.]
[It harbored strong hatred, so we were on guard.]
[Fortunately, its breath just stopped.]
A wolf pup? How could that be any threat?
As Silvan was tilting his head in confusion.
Twitch—
His ears perked up. He could hear the conversation of maids passing near the training ground. Of course, he could usually hear them well. Since their conversation topics were trivial, he would normally ignore them, but this time was a bit different.
"I heard the first young master returned?"
"Yeah, they say he's heading to the plaza now."
Shane Arcdute, who had left to subjugate monsters, had returned.
At that news, Silvan slightly frowned. Shane returning meant Burke, who went with him, had also returned.
That meant those tedious sword lessons would start again.
'I wish I could just learn swordsmanship from Ferda...'
Since he was good enough to beat Casher, it wasn't an impossible hope. Silvan let out an inaudible sigh. Then he heard the conversation again.
"They brought back a really huge monster."
"Really?"
"That's what they said. Its body was much bigger than a bull."
"Just how big was it?"
"Hmm, about ten times bigger than a bull?"
"Come on, no way. It couldn't be that big."
While eavesdropping on the conversation, Silvan's eyes sparkled with curiosity.
'A monster ten times bigger than a bull?'
When he was growing up in the forest, he'd seen monsters before.
But the biggest one he'd seen was at most the size of a brown bear. But ten times bigger than a bull? That was interesting enough. So Silvan looked up at Ferda and spoke to him.
"Um, Ferda."
"You want to go see the plaza, right?"
"Huh, how did you know?"
Silvan asked in surprise. Then Ferda just smiled silently and looked toward where the plaza was.
'Because I could smell the monster.'
Even back on Earth, he was amazingly good at smelling monsters. His friend Jeff Grayson used to tease him that he became an SSS-rank hunter with his sense of smell.
"Since training's over, should we go take a look?"
"Yeah!"
When the answer he wanted came out, Silvan smiled brightly.