《Only I Am A Reader》Chapter 7 - Sword of Epoch
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Chapter 7 - Sword of Epoch
Spots of light shone within the darkness as the starry sky glittered like a sea inlaid with gems, appearing increasingly beautiful as one stared at it…
‘The sky is really clear…’
As of the moment, one of those staring at it was none other than the young boy known as Arthur, Leo’s current persona.
After returning back with Annie, the sky had already turned dark and the rest of his ‘siblings’ had already gone to sleep with Ria following soon after, the only one left asleep was Leo.
Unlike the rest of the kids at the Orphanage, Arthur liked to sleep outside when it was summer. This way, not only would he leave one more free bed for his siblings, but he would also have a breeze of fresh air to help him with his sleep. He had a hammock-like sheet hanged between the two trees that gave shade to the Orphanage.
‘This place does have its own charm.’
While this world was quite the deadly one, it had its own advantages as a fantasy world. Not to mention the clear unpolluted sky, just the plant life was very exotic, the flowers that Annie had collected were truly gorgeous. To someone like Leo, living in such an environment was a completely new but attractive experience.
He had already managed to come to an understanding of his situation thanks to the hints given by the personal book. He was transported into this novel through his special ability which the book identified as the role of a ‘Reader’.
If he just had doubts about it at the beginning, it was practically confirmed as soon as he experienced the excitement he felt towards living in the novel. It was just too similar or even identical to the instinctive excitement he felt when reading.
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However, he didn’t completely understand the situation just yet, he still didn’t understand what suddenly triggered this change within his ability.
Was there something special about the book he had read before fainting? Or was the cause something much deeper like the world changing for some unknown reason? Whatever it was, it had managed to evolve his ability from just being able to obtain the ‘experience’ of the book to allowing him to personally experience the book itself…
‘Haaa…’
Closing his eyes for a few seconds, Leo let out a long sigh before opening it back again. Even though he tried not to think about it, he couldn’t stop overthinking!
In order to stop it, he could only switch the topic in his mind into something more urgent like his scapegoat event that was about to happen soon.
With that thought in mind, Leo lowered his gaze slightly as he started into the horizon, focusing on a tall structure that seemed to pierce the sky.
In his gaze, the tall structure was extremely slim, appearing like a tall stick, but that was just the case due to the spot that Leo observed the structure from.
‘So that’s the Sword of Epoch?’
It was just the edge of the gigantic longsword that was stabbed into the ground, even from his spot, Leo felt it was extremely imposing. This sword was basically the cornerstone plot point of this novel.
Just like most fantasy novels, fantasy abilities always had a mysterious source that they emerged from, and the mysterious source of this novel was none other than this sky piercing sword.
‘It isn’t that original, but it was slightly fresh at the point it was written.’
Less than three decades ago, this gigantic longsword had fallen from the sky out of nowhere, causing the destruction of an entire city, and giving rise to an earthquake. The people of this world thought that the apocalypse was coming.
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However, unlike what they were worried about, no other objects fell down from the sky and the sword’s victim list stopped at this, even the shattered ground that the sword stood on started to naturally recover.
As people felt that the sword no longer posed a threat, they became more daring. Which signalled the dispatch of the first expedition to explore the location that the sword was rooted on.
That was precisely the turning point, as the expedition members got closer to the sword, they could see faint sword shadows floating in the air, and its source was their expedition target, but that wasn’t the greatest discovery of that expedition.
As they finally stood before the sword itself, the expedition team found a scroll of paper that covered the lower part of the sword, seemingly containing strange scribblings mixed with their own language.
Only when they removed it did they understand its greatness. The body of the sword was full of mysterious symbols, of which they could understand nothing, and that was where the scroll came to play!
A great scholar that accompanied the expedition team studied the scroll as the rest of team members were busy getting amazed by the symbol, making the discovery that this scroll was more or less a hard dictionary for the symbols on the sword!
The symbols turned out to be practice texts that described sword movements that didn’t make sense. Everything only came to light when one of the guards of the expedition couldn’t resist trying them out, resulting in the faint sword shadows in the air rushing towards his body, announcing the start of the great sword era!
By using the movements within the practice text, people became capable of storing what came to be known as sword breath into their bodies, allowing them to display great prowess as long as they wielded a sword, and before anyone knew it the world had already changed…
Even the planets and animals that knew nothing about the events that took place changed to various degrees. Some strange beasts appeared, and even some metals changed in nature, the whole world was undergoing an overall evolution.
Nonetheless, the one that led this evolution was still humans, ushering into a new hierarchy reliant on sword prowess. Kingdoms were destroyed overnight, and others were declared, completely changing the original map. It was only a decade later that the turmoil in the world started to calm down once again.
It was then that one special person arrived in this world…
‘Tsk, just as to be expected of a protagonist’s lucky aura…’
As he finished recalling the main plotline that the author had info-dumped at the very start of the novel. Leo couldn’t help but click his tongue in dissatisfaction.
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Warlord 6
Five hundred years after ninety percent of the western continent was swallowed by the five human warlords who lead the demon swarm upon earth, a girl is orphaned at a young age, left alone on a small peasant city on the remaining coastal land of the western continent. She fought for every inch of her life everyday and everynight. Then one day, I army showed up to the city, and burnt many buildings to the ground. The girl was caught in the middle of this, was caught by one grand soldier, guarded by many others, this soldier was the king of the men. She tried running from him, but could not escape the guards. Little did she know where this would lead.
8 131Csick
Nate wakes up with no memories. As he partially regains them he realizes that something is wrong. He’s living in a fantasy world, as the character in a story. He continues struggling with the mysterious writer while winning the contest of his dreams. A chance to go aboard the Csick cruise liner and battle against the best writers that can be found in this strange fantasy world. His roommates include Stan Realman, five raccoons in a trenchcoat masquerading as a human. He is joined by Luke, the gentle giant who writes romance, Alvin the fortune teller, and many more. Between mermaids and fire-spewing flowers, Nate faces intense writing contests and fierce competitions. There’s also a theme song, the occasional over-the-top martial arts move, brainstorms that physically manifest, and a hint of romance.
8 134The Rektoning: DeadHeads revolt
Not all births are a gift from God, some are in fact gruesome, bloody, and involve a lot of pain and trauma. This goes doubly so if you're a not quite zombie, not quite human undead man baby called DeadHead. Stuck dealing with gods who think of humans as playthings, Demons that won't shut the hell up, and a curse that thinks it owns his body. Witness the ugly and cruel conception of a new type of hero. Spoiler he doesn't survive the birth...
8 121Storm Drains (pennywise love fan-fic) *completed*
Sitting in her dark room with tears streaming down her face and a broken heart, she had been completely oblivious to the tall shadow that lurked within the corners of her room. The same tall dark shadow that would change her life forever. (There is going to be plenty of SMUT in this book so beware!) I saw some pennywise the dancing clown love fan fics going around and decided to challenge myself and write one. If you are not comfortable with this idea then simply don't read it. This is for my pennywise lovers out there:)
8 65Blade of Gaia
Seth Nox, also known as the Blade, is the infamous killer that hunts his targets on the continent of Gaia. Gaia’s citizens fear his name and fear they’ll be his next target. But lately, there have been rumors that have mysteriously surfaced; rumors of an organization raiding, pillaging and senselessly murdering civilians. Now, with orders from the Queen of Gaia, Seth is tasked to find this new deadly force and give them eternal slumber. But what will happen when this game of cat and mouse turns into that of hunter and hunted. The biggest threat Seth has ever had to face is slowly drawing the knife.
8 217Chakra Spider
With great power comes great responsibility but Peter had never imagined getting in contact with such power. Disclaimer: I do not own anything
8 125