Chapter 771: Act 125 – Eternity XXVI
The final blow had clearly taken effect.
The world faded away like a receding tide, dissolving into patches of light dancing like butterflies. After the scenery of the boundless fields beneath the setting sun disappeared, what remained behind was the unchanged landscape of caves frozen beneath millennia of ice. A cold wind howled, sending chills down both Brendel and Charles. “My Lord!?” Before anyone could react, Medisa’s concerned voice rang out. Another voice, more composed, inquired, “Brendel, has that thing pulled you to the Extreme Plains—?” This was Veronika, the alluring voice of the female commander.
The Extreme Plains? Brendel abruptly raised his head, but there was no trace of dusk, sunset, or fields around him; all that remained was the dark blue ice cave, with the Philas couple, Veronika, the young dragon with her gluttonous little brother, Xi, Medisa and the huntress maiden she was supporting, Gray Saint Mephistopheles, as well as the Crown Prince and the Crusian Crown Prince positioned slightly farther away. Everyone was present, and everything seemed as if nothing had happened; Brendel scanned around, finally resting his gaze on Babasha and the witches beside her.
Babasha’s eyes burned with fervent light, and those witches, who usually seemed disdainful of dealing with mortals, exchanged glances with one another, yet all of them looked at Brendel with some suspicion.
Then there were the young dragon’s golden eyes, filled with puzzlement, seemingly holding a flickering flame within.
“You smell strange.” Alorze sniffed, frowning as he spoke.
Brendel took a breath; he was hurt all over, wincing from the pain, but upon hearing the young dragon’s question, he surprisingly became quiet.
He almost thought everything was a dream—
But fortunately, the witches’ gazes and the young dragon’s confusion resolved his doubts.
He unconsciously clenched his right hand, the thing in his palm was the answer to everything that had happened earlier. However, the others clearly did not notice this subtle movement. Charles exchanged a glance with him, while Veronika and Mephistopheles’s gazes were directed at Brendel’s left hand—where the Earth Sword had long been sheathed, slung diagonally on his back, and what he held tightly was another sword.
The blade resembled a slender leaf, frost blue, as if made of ice crystals.
“The Frost Singer Xina—” Veronika’s voice asked, “Brendel, what exactly happened? Were you pulled into the Extreme Plains?”
What had happened.
That was a good question, especially for Brendel. He lifted his head, but everything that had occurred earlier seemed to replay in his mind:
“The Frozen Soil Domain!” Accompanied by Sibers raising the slender, bright blade of the Frost Singer Xina, an aura of cold ice spread like ripples from his body in all directions. As the icy fog swept past, the sound of the ground cracking echoed, and countless frost-white ice shards burst from the earth, stretching toward the sky like fangs, covering nearly a hundred feet in an instant. Brendel finally remembered this move, controlling the frozen ground, delivering a fierce wind; he was all too familiar with it—when a person sees certain past events, they often feel a sense of nostalgia, a sentiment that stems from humanity’s reminiscences of times gone by—now it was the same for Brendel, this retro maneuver seemed to pull him back to the first three versions of The Amber Sword, his blood surged, and before he even had time to react, his body instinctively moved.
The power of his muscles exploded as he leapt high, a slicing sound tore through the air, and the ice shards shooting up from the ground barely grazed the soles of his boots.
At that moment, the ancient undead looked up in astonishment.
Brendel remembered how the flame-like soul fire in its eye sockets suddenly brightened. Sibers raised his sword again, the blade growing equally luminous, ice dust gathered behind him as if taking shape and suddenly formed a cyclone, conjuring a bone-chilling wind that rushed toward him. The fierce wind, or what could be called Milos’s sword, contained countless shining ice crystals scattered within the cold wind—their sharp points like ice spears that could easily slice through even the toughest armor, and the wind surged forward, Sibers and his sword appeared like a general commanding the storm, pointing the sword forward, the storm would devour everything ahead.
What a spectacular scene it was.
Brendel was like a drifting, unstable leaf in midair, instantly caught in the eye of the storm, countless ice crystals passing through his body, yet the imagined scene of him being ripped apart, blood pouring down failed to occur. At the critical moment, he executed another flickering swordstrike. The dark blade sliced forth, as if it had been practiced countless times before, its speed reaching the pinnacle that this world could bear, the space around him buzzed and trembled as he was pulled in one direction. Those sharp, ice spear-like ice crystal fragments seemed trapped by an invisible force, naturally sliding apart to either side, drawn behind him, intermingling as they passed.
And before him, the distance in space had been distorted by an equally immense force, Sibers’s pale face suddenly seeming to cross a hundred feet and appear right in front of him.
Brendel swung his sword toward the waist of Sibers—the Frost Knight King, who was unprepared to defend that area.
But just as his blade neared the target, the soil beneath Sibers’s feet seemed to come alive, rising to form a solid barrier that caused Brendel’s sword to strike heavily upon it; with a loud thud, a visible shockwave centered around Brendel’s blade spread outward from the wall, creating fine cracks all over, which rapidly expanded before shattering and collapsing.
However, Brendel’s offensive stopped there, the only accomplishment being the destruction of a wall of earth.
But this was no ordinary wall.
This was one of the Frost Knight’s life-saving skills, the Frost Earth Wall; the Frost Earth Guardian draws 20% of its current mana to raise a barrier from the ground (the material of the barrier is determined by the environment, if the Frost Earth Guardian has the ‘Gloom Ice’ specialization, an additional layer of solid ice is added to the barrier: Hardness +2), the barrier will automatically absorb one deadly blow, returning its remaining life to the caster. The Frost Earth Guardian can only cast this skill while on the ground. Trading a hit to knock down Sibers’s life-saving skill, Brendel was already quite satisfied, at least it proved his attack was still a threat to the opponent, and this realization boosted his confidence significantly.
However, before he could feel smug, a black iron boot suddenly lunged out from behind the shattered Frost Earth Wall—pitch-black armor, decorated with bone patterns—the Minren’s excessive worship of death was well-known. With his vision obstructed, Brendel could hardly react before being kicked hard in the abdomen, feeling as if he had been struck head-on by a giant dragon; even before he could register the pain surging within him, he was sent flying like a cannonball.
This guy hadn’t even been forced to use his life-saving skill! In the blink of an eye, Brendel realized that Sibers’s use of the Frost Earth Wall was merely to block his view—this move could be utilized in such a manner.
If this were still in the past during the game, Brendel would have been overjoyed; in an era where all combat systems had essentially been explored, to discover a new approach would surely shock the entire game order. A fresh approach was extremely important to experts, especially for someone like him who was top-tier but not the very best. Such a chance might be enough to propel him onto a divine pedestal.
Even now, this move sparked a flash of inspiration in him; while there were many schools in The Amber Sword, using a life-saving skill for assault was extremely rare, and even rarer to use it to disrupt the enemy, as not everyone was as confident as Sibers; Brendel had encountered so many skills, traits, and talents, that while Sibers was still limited by the limited vision of the Frost Earth Guardian, Brendel had long found countless applications for this move in his mind.
But not now.
In an instant, he became aware of his situation; in the next moment, he would crash down heavily into the sharp ice spikes of the Frozen Soil Domain. The damage was not a concern, but the freezing state would cost him his life. Brendel knew that his willpower, though exceeding a hundred, was still far from enough against a perfect body of that caliber.
Indeed, Sibers redirected the Frost Singer Xina towards him. Clearly, Brendel’s guess was not wrong; he had been waiting for this opportunity for quite some time.
“I absolutely cannot fall!”
“Brendel!”
His thoughts matched Sage Ausoor’s warning almost simultaneously, but what could he do? In this state, he couldn’t find any leverage to adjust his posture, let alone assume the basic stance for the flickering sword. The Queen Wind’s Nine Luminaries wouldn’t help him move; the Sanctuary Knight’s skills seemed useless at this moment, while the basic warrior skills like Charge and Piercing Strike couldn’t be executed in this state of imbalance. Those twenty plus levels as an Elementalist were hardly worth mentioning; was he meant to give up his Unyielding talent here?
No.
Brendel gritted his teeth, he knew that there would probably be an even tougher battle ahead. Anlek was no goodie, not to mention the fervent followers of the Everything Returns Society around him. If he lost his Unyielding talent in what seemed like merely a trial, it would be too unworthy.
“Don’t take risks, Brendel!” Sage Ausoor seemed to see through Brendel’s thoughts, unable to help but urgently remind him.
“No, I’m not taking risks, you can rest assured, my Lady Wind.” Brendel lifted his head; the entire thought process took just a moment. He could almost feel the biting coldness coming from behind him, and if he hesitated for even a moment, he would crash heavily into that thicket of ice spikes, triggering the effects of the Frozen Soil Domain, becoming imprisoned in an ice crown—though it would last less than half a second, it would be more than enough time for Sibers to kill him a thousand times over.
Now the only chance that could help him seemed to be heading in one particular direction.
His other identity—
He knew that the Dark Dragon shared this same identity; perhaps Sibers was not unfamiliar with it. As this thought barely formed, a circle of sky-blue light began to emerge around Brendel’s hand—threads of laws intermingling in his palm were powers that did not belong to the comprehension of mortals—the undead knight Sibers’s eye sockets flickered slightly as he noticed the blue light, even letting out a soft gasp: “So it’s this…”
That was the power of the Wayfarer.
……(To be continued. If you enjoy this work, please support it with recommendations and monthly votes on qidian.com, your support is my greatest motivation.)
