There was once a time where I left my phone plugged to my charger overnight, almost end up burning the whole house. Since then, I don’t sleep without my phone fully charged, though I always end up waking up late.

***

Beautiful, golden, and broken are the only words that could describe the current state of the legendary sword that said to have been used to slay dragons that are known to be strong. And I who is holding it and the people watching me, are bewildered and shocked.

After all, who would think that the sword that is considered to be the Sacred Treasure and has been used to slay a dragon be in a state of being broken.

After a short while, I, Teldarg, and the council recovered from the shock we received.

“It’s a fake right? It’s just something to test one’s strength right? It broke easily since it’s a fake right? RIGHT!?”

“C-calm down young man. Even us who has lived for centuries don’t know what happened.”

I got too shaken and threw the hilt to the floor. Teldarg is also confused to what happened so he doesn’t know what to do.

Immediately after that, Beld rushed to the broken hilt. When he tried to lift it, surprisingly, he can’t. What is that, Thor’s Hammer?

“It’s the real one?”

When Geral recovered from the shock, he curiously looked at the broken hilt that’s on the floor.

“Hmm, I can feel the sword’s power just by standing near it. Without a doubt, it’s the real one.”

“There must be some kind of mistake. If the young man’s strength is worthy, he should be able to pull it out without a problem. If he isn’t, he would not be able to pull it out and Gardaruqa would attack him. Breaking the sword is something that is never heard of before.”

“Well anyhow, it broke. It’s not usable anymore as a weapon.”

Everyone scratched their heads in puzzlement since we don’t know what to do with the broken treasure. Well, everyone except Geral.

All of a sudden, Geral walked towards me with an angry expression.

“You! What did you do to the sword? Before you pulled it out, I felt a sudden surge of power from you. I doubt you didn’t do anything.”

Since he’s hitting me with his thick finger on my stomach, I backed away a bit.

“I did do something, but not to the sword.”

“Then what?!”

“I just happen to apply some boosts on myself. I didn’t know the sword was fragile so I thought that I had to put one on myself to make sure I pull out the sword.”

After listening to me, Geral clicked his tongue and turned towards the sword again.

“Boosting one-self to pull out the sword isn’t the first time this has happened. So the sword broke for an unknown reason. My King, would you permit me to open the ancient scripture here?”

He muttered some words to himself, after that, he turned towards Teldarg while bowing.

“I permit it, but tell the public to get away from here first. I don’t want the ancient scripture to get exposed to anyone. There are spies here after all.”

Spies, I didn’t know there are such things here. Wait, no, my location was exposed despite not telling anyone. Without a doubt, they do exist also here in Marzenthura.

Well leaving that aside for now, the king told his people to leave the square. And to make sure that the said scripture wouldn’t get exposed, I summoned on my own accord, an octagonal prism shaped barrier which also prevents light from entering. I called it >.

After making a source for illumination in the room, everyone looked at me with an amazed expression.

“As expected from the grandson of a great magician. Making a grand magic without using any chant… I’ve never seen or heard of such person before.”

“I see. Then can we please see what the said scripture has to say with what has happened now? I happen to be anxious, so can you please hurry up?”

“So impatient, I’m going to read it right now.”

Well, I can understand.

After reading the ancient scripture, which is in scroll form, Geral gave us what he understood from it. I tried to read it, but it’s written in a different language, probably Dwarven, I immediately gave up.

“According to the ancient scripture, like we understood and witnessed over the years, the only ones who can pull out the sword are the ones who have the required strength the Sword expects from you.”

“But it was said to be indestructible. How did this young man manage to break it?”

“I’m not finished explaining my King, I still have something more to say.”

Geral took a short peek at the broken sword and then rubbed his beard.

“The part where I said ‘Required Strength’, it didn’t mean a physical one. It talks about the Strength of one’s Pride. However, it wasn’t mentioned what kind of Pride it was talking about.”

“There are different kinds of pride a mortal has. Probably one of those became the reason why the sword broke.”

“I don’t quite understand. I’m not the type of person who has the pride enough to break this Sacred Sword. Yes, I’m quite greedy, but pride? I don’t know about that.”

Then for some reason, I felt a cold air entering my barrier. When I turn my head, I saw Sora walking out of the shadow along with Cherry.

“What are you-”

“What are you doing here you Spy!?”

Just when I was about to ask Sora, Beld suddenly yelled out while holding a who-knows-where-he-pulled-it-out hammer with mechanical gear design.

“Hey there Beld, it’s been a while.”

In contrast to that, Sora replied to him care-freely along with his usual poker smile.

“Suddenly popping out in front of me, you have some [Gerdello].”

To all my readers, Gerdello means “Balls” in a gutsy way. Never thought I’d hear a person say that here though.

Beld jumped along with his large hammer raised in the air towards Sora while letting out a battle cry.

“I’m not here as a spy. I’m not even trying to be one even from before. >”

Using the shadows of everyone including mine, numerous black ropes came out of them and wrapped Beld forming a black cocoon with only his face out. Not only that, Sora’s dagger is held by a shadow tentacle in front of Beld’s face.

“F-Flordist, I didn’t know you were here in Berigious. I have a lot of questions to ask but, can you please free Beld? I know that there’s a rivalry between you two, but please let’s all professionals here. This isn’t what you came here for, right?”

After listening to Teldarg’s plead, Sora let out a sigh and snapped his fingers.

When the black cocoon had dispersed, Beld dropped on the floor. He gave Sora a dangerous glare like it could kill someone.

“Just because my magic allows me to do covert activities doesn’t mean I have to do such things. I know my position. Didn’t I say that the first time we met? This is why I plainly showed everyone here my magic because I don’t want to show that I’m an enemy.”

Wow, I didn’t think that Sora has been thinking of his power like that.

Come to think of it, he plainly showed his power to me from the beginning. That probably explains why I could trust him and his power. This blew my mind.

“Yes, I know that well. But still, we couldn’t just trust you as you can go anywhere you want past our security. As the King of Berigious, I want you to show respect of our City by walking on it without using such ability.”

“Then as the Knight of the Valeshtyre Kingdom, I will respect your words.”

While saying so, he bowed his head with his hand on his chest.

“So, what did you come here Sora? And why did you bring Cherry with you?”

“Ah, that. Actually, it’s Cherry who has something to tell you.”

Then when we turned to Cherry, we saw something really odd.

“C-Cherry? How did you manage to lift it?”

“This? I picked it up because it looked so important. Also, I can sense immense power from it.”

Right, for some unknown reason, Cherry is holding the broken sword like it’s normal. Well, apart from it’s actually a normal thing to do, this broken sword isn’t normal.

“Why is everyone looking at me with weird looks?”

Cherry is just looking at us with a clueless expression.

“Actually, what you’re holding right now is the Immortal Sword of Giants.”

“This detached hilt?”

Cherry analyzed it carefully with her eyes like she couldn’t believe it.

“Just put it back on the floor and leave it. That thing might break even more if we leave it like that.”

“Wait a second! I can sense something from the sword.”

“I can see it through my magic eyes. The sword is suddenly glowing bright.”

Just when I was about to take the hilt away from Cherry, she held it away from me. And for some reason, Sora is also wearing the same expression as him.

I tried to steal away the sword from Cherry, but when I touched it, all of a sudden, a huge burst of light from the hilt struck and destroyed my barrier then went to the sky.

The light is so bright that it erased any traces of shadow we have around us.

Then when the light cleared out, the supposed to be broken sword, has suddenly become a full sword. Both Cherry and I were bewildered on the beautiful golden sword in front of us that we forgot that we were holding it together.

“A-amazing…”

Cherry stole the words right off my mouth. Even though I don’t have the > ability, I could feel the tremendous power surging from the sword.

“So this is the [Immortal Sword of Giants].”

Now I understand why it’s called Sword of Giants. The sword’s appearance is already beautiful by itself. Symmetrically drawn runic symbols, beautifully laced edges, unknown colorful gems that sparks with power, and a size that’s five times bigger than a normal great sword. Cherry and I aren’t using boosts, but we could lift it with ease.

“Truly Remarkable! No matter how many times I see this sword, it still amazes me. My respect to the Ancient Ones who created this will never disappear as I cannot create a sword as great as this!”

I was still in the middle of trance from the sword’s beauty, but got disrupted by Teldarg’s sudden outburst.

“Leaving that for now, I want to know the reason why it activated now.”

“I don’t know. This is the first time I’ve seen such case. However—”

Before continuing his words, Teldarg’s eyes shifted towards Cherry. Don’t look at her chest please.

“—her, lifting it too is also surprising. No offense but, I’ve never seen a woman lift the sword before.”

When he pointed that out, Cherry and I noticed that our hands were touching each other while holding the sword’s grip.

“I think we should let go.”

“O-okay.”

When we did, I also notice Sora grinning for some reason.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Moments later, the giant sword suddenly shrunk and the magic power dissipated. Unlike before, it didn’t become a hilt. Instead, it transformed itself into a cane.

“Okay, this is interesting.”

I notice that the Council and Teldarg are whispering something to each other. Since their voices are really low, I couldn’t gasp what their topic is.

Then I turn myself to Cherry.

“So, what did you come here for exactly?”

When I asked her that, her face slightly becomes read and averts from my stare.

“Well, I sensed some strong and very powerful magic aside from yours. I got a bit worried so I asked Sora to send me here.”

A bit huh… She never likes to be direct. I guess it’s just her personality.

I put my hand on her head and then gave her a smile.

“Then, thank you. If you didn’t come here, I wouldn’t be able to get the sword properly.”

“Ah! Uhm… thank you too.”

As expected, her face turned red from embarrassment.

After that, I went to the gathered Council and talked to them.

“I’d like to ask something from the council, if you would permit me of course.”

Everyone looked at each other like they’re talking via eye contact. After that, they nodded and listened to my request.

“Since this is an unexpected development, I want to know. Is there a case like this that has happened before?”

“We don’t know. The sword existed for almost hundreds of thousands of years already. There are records of who used it before in the Archives, but I doubt that this has happened before.”

Speaking for the Council, Teldarg apologetically answered me.

So the sword is that old huh.

“Is that so? But you spoke about Archives. Can I see them? It might help me learn about the sword.”

“I’m sorry young man, but the access to the Archives is not allowed even to you. Only I can access it.”

A block huh…

If only I can read the history about it, maybe I’ll be able to speed up my journey on searching for the Sacred Weapons.

“However, I could let you borrow some of the books from the archives. There are secrets in the Archive that mustn’t be shown to the world, that’s why no one is allowed to enter aside from me.”

“Oh! That’s a great idea. How can I express my gratitude?”

After I said that, the King looked around his city.

“How about we have a celebration for the new year?”

Wait a minute. Today’s the New Year?!

A lot of things has have happened that I didn’t notice that it’s today already!

“Gladly!”

-End of Chapter-