Darius looks around as he follows Ashera, Hlin, and Vanbok towards the blacksmith. He pays a small amount of attention to his surroundings as he practices controlling the Arcane Shield. They shortly arrive at the blacksmith, walking into the shop Darius sees a few racks of weapons and shields. As well as weapons hanging on the walls, there is a door on the back wall, leading deeper into the store.

Darius looks along the racks, ignoring what’s on the walls, before he finally notices the spears on a rack. He walks over to the rack as the rest of the group goes up to the counter to get the attention of someone from the back of the store.

Darius spends some time examining the spears, picking them up to do so. He is surprised when a screen pops up.

Skill Gained [Basic Identification lvl 1]

Information gained from identification increased by 3%

Chance of detection decreased by 2%

Allows the user to identify objects and people.

It’s useful to learn someones deep dark secrets.

Darius closes the screen, and looks around, he jumps when he sees someone standing right next to him looking at him intently. “Uh, Hi there?” Darius says as he steps back from the woman.

She looks over him, before she nods “A spear user huh? Not a very good one If I had to guess.” Darius frowns a little, looking over her. She is just shorter than Darius, has blue hair, and bright sky blue eyes. “And what makes you say that?” He asks as he steps back a bit more.

“Well, it’s obvious you’ve never use a spear before. Sure you could just pick one up and thrust it at someone, but that’s not using a spear properly, there’s an art to it.” The woman says as she shakes her head.

“Well, what weapon would you suggest I use then?” He asks looking a little confused. “Well, since you seem to be going mage first, I’d suggest a longsword or another type of sword, sure you are going to need to train to use it, but you won’t have to carry around a giant pole with a pointy end.” Ashera walks up to the woman and pokes her in the side. “I hope you realize you haven’t introduced yourself yet.”

“Ah right, sorry about that, I’m Aenwyn, Ashera’s cousin” Aenwyns says as she holds out her hand. Darius cautiously reaches out to shake it, nodding a little. “Well it’s nice to meet you Aenwyn, I’m Darius.”

“So, you say a sword would be best for me, how about a short sword, like a Gladius maybe? Especially since I don’t have a lot of money” Darius asks as he looks over towards the racks and racks of swords. “I’m sure we have something you’ll like, you can have a discount, my cousins friends generally get a small one.”

“Well, thank you.” Darius says nodding as he follows Aenwyn over to the racks with the swords. He looks over them, unsure which to look at first before he is handed one by Aenwyn. It’s close to a foot long, with a blue-green blade, and a pommel styled like a hawk. “Identification.” Darius whispers as he looks at the blade.

Gladius of the Storm Hawk

+1 Constitution

+2 Dexterity

10% chance to cause people in 1.5 meters to become stunned.

A sword created from a rare metal, stylized after a magical bird.

“And just how much would this sword cost me?” Darius says after he reads and dismisses the screen. Aenwyn seems to think for a few seconds before she says “Let’s say one silver and five coppers? That’s including a sheath and sword belt”

“That sounds good to me, I’m guessing you can make change?” Darius says as he reaches into his coin purse to take out his money. She nods as she takes his coins, heading back to the counter to get him a sword belt and his change. He follows after her “Thank you very much, I’ll be sure to stop in again when I need an upgrade.” He says with a smile. “Well come back any time.” Aenwyn says as he starts to walk back to the group, leaving with them.

Once they’ve left the blacksmiths Ashera looks around “Now, we are going to want to get you used to using that sword. Let’s go to the training grounds.” Ashera says before she leads the group through the city.

They soon find themselves at the training grounds of the city, a fairly large area with sand on the ground, a few training dummies, as well as a couple of sparing rings. “Let’s start you off with learning how to swing and stab with a sword, then you can try attacking the dummy a few times, and we’ll end with a spar.” Ashera says as she looks at him, seeming to have become a different person entirely. “Uh, yeah, that sounds like a plan.” Darius says as he looks around slightly, drawing his sword.

He spends the next few hours alternating between swinging and stabbing repeatedly. He starts off sloppily, but he slowly improves. Ashera drives him to near exhaustion as she demands he speeds up his strikes. Mid swing Darius is surprised when a screen pops up in front of him.

Skill Learned [Basic Short Sword Use lvl 1]

Attacks with Short Sword Deal 2% more damage

Attacks with Short Sword Cost 3% less stamina

Grants Basic Knowedge of Sword use

Finally learned how to use a sword huh? It’s a good skill to have in the world you’ve found yourself in.

“Looks like you’ve finally gained the skill, now we can move onto the dummy.” Ashera says after she notices his pause from reading. She has Darius use his sword on the dummy for the next couple of hours to improve his stance and to show him common weak points that he could exploit. He levels up his sword use a few times, getting it to level 3.

Ashera looks up towards the sky, seeing that it’s getting fairly late. “Right, I think we’ll push off the spar until the morning, let you rest after training today.” She says as she nods, looking at Darius. “Thanks.” He says, have been sweating buckets for most of the afternoon. “You best get back and sleep early. After all, we’ll be getting you up bright and early for the spar and more training.”

Darius thanks Ashera again before he leaves the training area and makes his way back into the inn, asking for some food to be brought up to his room before he goes up. He lays on his bed, groaning as he closes his eyes for a moment.