[School of the Wolf Witcher Swordsmanship Experience +1!]
Aiken lifted his head, teeth clenched tight.
The wall was reflected in his green cat eyes, anger and frustration tangled within them.
He suddenly pushed against the floor with both hands, and his neck immediately touched the edge of the sword.
The wooden sword was blunt, but it pierced his heart like a needle, jolting his mind clear.
He was silent for a few seconds, then his hands went limp.
“I…
I lost.”
“Oh, praise Alvin!”
Paul shouted in excitement.
“Winston, did you see that?
I won!
Your green juice tomorrow morning is mine!”
Winston clenched his fists, looking sulky.
The apprentices cheered and applauded Alvin, but there was no smile on his face.
He moved the wooden sword away from Aiken’s neck.
He did not exactly hate Aiken.
The boy was young and competitive, and even his jealousy was written plainly on his face.
Compared with people who hid knives behind their smiles, he was much easier to deal with.
Alvin moved his foot away, bent down, and held out his hand to Aiken.
Horton shouted at that moment, “The winner of this duel is the Drowner Slayer, Alvin.
In accordance with the mutual-aid principle of the Witcher’s Code, he must offer a helping hand.”
Aiken looked at Alvin’s hand with his cat eyes and hesitated for a moment.
He badly wanted to slap it away.
But that would leave him looking like a dog crawling on the ground, which was far too humiliating, so he took the hand and let Alvin pull him up.
“Give me a few more days to train.
Next time, I won’t lose to you.”
Hearing Aiken’s defiant words beside his ear, Alvin smiled helplessly.
“As long as it’s a fair duel, you’re welcome anytime.”
Experience delivered right to his door.
How could he not want that?
Aiken snorted, rubbed his knee, and sat down by the bed.
Paul came over to Alvin.
“Alvin, how did you learn your swordsmanship?
Teach us, will you?
Vesemir tore into us today.”
“Yeah, help us out,” Horton said as well.
Alvin looked at those expectant cat eyes.
He had just defeated Aiken and gained 2 experience points.
Would sparring with these apprentices earn him even more experience?
As the saying went, actual combat was the best teacher.
It was definitely better than practicing alone.
And after six years together, Alvin did not mind helping them.
“Sure.
When there’s time, we can spar with each other.
Just don’t start crying about the pain.”
“Huh?
Spar with you?” Paul froze for a moment.
“You beat Aiken with one strike.
How are we supposed to match you?”
Alvin said, “No, he just got impatient.
If we’d kept going, it would’ve been hard to say who’d win.”
Paul and the others’ cat eyes lit up, and they all looked toward Aiken, only to see him turn his back on them and snort through his nose.
“Dong!”
The bell of Kaer Morhen rang.
“Quick, hide the wooden swords.
It’ll be bad if Vesemir finds them.”
Everyone swiftly returned to their beds.
Alvin and Aiken skillfully shoved the wooden swords back underneath.
The apprentices on both sides blew out the candles on the bedside cabinets, pulled up their blankets, and closed their eyes.
Darkness settled over their vision.
In the shadows outside the apprentices’ quarters, a pair of amber cat eyes suddenly appeared.
Vesemir stood there quietly.
No one knew how long he had been watching, but in the end, a satisfied smile tugged at the corners of his weathered mouth.
By midnight, Alvin suddenly opened his eyes.
He could not sleep.
Every time he closed his eyes, the Basic Meditation taught by Lady Vries filled his mind.
No.
He had to try it.
After listening carefully and confirming that Paul and the other four were breathing evenly and deeply, Alvin sat up.
Because of his promise to Vries, he could not privately teach the meditation technique to anyone else, so he decided to go outside and train.
He picked up his clothes, carefully left the apprentices’ quarters, and went to a hidden corner in the front yard of Kaer Morhen.
It was the same place where he had installed the Mutagen last time.
The autumn wind of the North was already bitterly cold in September, making his mind even clearer.
He glanced up at the starry sky overhead, and the faint call of an owl drifted through the air.
Alvin knelt on the ground, both palms loosely held before his lower abdomen.
He recalled the knowledge of meditation in his mind.
Meditation, to put it simply, meant calming the mind, focusing the spirit, and repeatedly visualizing something in one’s thoughts.
“Lady Vries’s Basic Meditation explains it very clearly.
The world is filled everywhere with Chaos energy, and magic is the act of drawing on that energy for one’s own use.”
“There are four kinds of Chaos energy: the four elements of Earth, Water, Air, and Fire.
As long as I can sense even one of them, I’ll barely count as having entered the door.”
Alvin adjusted his breathing, his chest rising and falling as he repeatedly visualized natural scenes in his mind: mountains, rivers, storms, raging flames.
But after a long while, the experience for [Basic Meditation] on his panel had not increased at all.
He did not get discouraged.
He simply continued the dull process again and again.
Suddenly, his nose twitched slightly, as if he had sensed some strange aura.
Joy surged through him.
“Is it an element?
Did I sense an element?”
“Haha, this element actually smells a little sweet.”
“No, wait.
Why is my head spinning?”
…
“Splash, splash, splash!”
Alvin felt as though he had been trapped in a heavy, muddled dream, his head aching as if it might split open.
He reached up and rubbed his temples, forcing his heavy eyelids open.
A brilliant river of stars hung in the night sky, and the sound of flowing water filled his ears.
Alvin’s cat eyes abruptly narrowed, and he sat up at once.
“This isn’t Kaer Morhen.
This is…”
He studied his surroundings.
On his left and right stood two towering cliffs, and between them ran a swift river.
He pursed his lips.
His mouth was dry and parched, while a strong, complex taste burst across his tongue.
After carefully identifying it, [Alchemy Sense] let him detect the presence of Banewarts.
A Potion!
His pitch-black vision began to invert.
The whole world lost its color, turning into a ghastly ash-gray.
Was it the [Cat] Potion?
“Hiss…
hiss…
hiss…”
A harsh, grating sound suddenly rang out.
Alvin quickly turned his head.
A yellowish-white outline of an upper body appeared on the surface of the water, like a modern thermal imager.
The monster broke out of the water, river water sliding down its dark blue scales.
Its bulging dead-fish eyes flashed with a crimson gleam.
“Hah!”
A shrill screech came.
Alarm bells went off in Alvin’s mind.
A Drowner!
He braced both palms against the ground, and a stiff sensation ran up his spine.
Alvin instinctively reached over his shoulder and gripped the cold metal.
[Blade Perception] triggered.
[Wolf School Witcher Silver Sword: A silver sword from the Kaer Morhen Armory collection.
Steel core plated with silver.
The blade is engraved with Elven Runes and has twenty flaws.
Total length: thirty-eight inches.
Blade length: twenty-five inches.
Weight: forty ounces.
Center of gravity: two and a half inches in front of the guard.
Suitable for slashing attacks.]
[Coated with Necrophage Blade Oil.
Will inflict massive damage on Necrophages.]
Necrophage Blade Oil?
Before he had time to be shocked, the Drowner that had surfaced was already charging, bringing a wave of fishy stench with it.
His right hand reached over his shoulder, drew the Silver Sword, and his cat eyes went still.
This was not his first time facing a Drowner.
The next instant, silver sword-light swept out.