From Player To Npc

Shingi and Annoue went their way towards the shop while Shingi kept his sense up for any Wolfhead Guild players. He understood that they seem to watch him since the last meeting with Fire Whip, so he kept his eyes open for them. He didn't like to be under watch, but he couldn't do something for now.

They made their way to the shop, and Shingi's senses told him that the four students of his were inside and waiting. So preparations should have finished, and they waited for them.

At that point, Shingi thought something he had seen on TV in the real world but never understood why one was doing it.

"Annoue, could you close your eyes."[Shingi]

Annoue seemed confused with the suggestion of her brother.

"What? Why?!?" [Annoue]

"Just do it. Trust me." [Shingi]

She did it even if she thought it weird, but she liked the idea of her brother helping her walk as he felt holding her hand to lead the way inside.

They went in, and Shingi made her stop a little distance from the entrance and let go.

A few seconds passed without Shingi saying anything to her, so she got worried, but then she heard his voice.

"Open your eyes now." [Shingi]

She did, and what she saw was something completely unexpected.

In front of her, the four individuals that helped them a few days ago against those annoying people. They were holding a banner which had written on it with big letters HAPPY BIRTHDAY.

Shingi was in the middle of them while holding a rectangular case box with both hands. It seemed to be a gift.

Annoue didn't know what to say. She hadn't had a birthday party for many years and couldn't remember the last one she had. After her brother was born, her mother was busy looking for a cure for him, while her father was busy with work or too drunk to do anything. Same with having a gift given to her.

Shingi moved towards her with the box in his hands as she didn't seem to walk anytime soon.

"This is part of your gift. How about you give it a test for now?" [Shingi]

Annoue seemed to snap out and opened the gift and saw something that she didn't expect to have any time soon but hoped to acquire one day.

It was an iron sword.

It didn't seem like a fancy one, and it was, in reality, a basic one that Shingi had given to his student money to buy for him. They had to get to another town as it didn't have an auction house or any other Blacksmith Shop, but the town had a Teleportation Circle but was expensive to use but not too expensive for Shingi, at least for one trip.

Annoue got the sword, which wasn't too heavy for her, even if it was heavier than the wooden dagger she usually used.

She took a few breaths and felt the sword's blade, and after a few seconds, she started making a few swings with it. It seemed like she was used to using it, but Shingi noticed quite a few improvements that she needed to work on.

"I love this gift, brother. Thank you so much. I will use it wisely and keep it safe forever." [Annoue]

Shingi smiled at it.

"Well, first is meant to protect YOU, not you protect IT. Also, as I said, this is part of your gift. I have to ask you to give it to me to finish it to the final gift of yours." [Shingi]

Annoue seemed to blush a little cause of her words as she reluctantly gave the sword to Shingi.

Shingi had already cast a MANA HAND to the mana blower main panel to feed the forge's fire.

He put his hand on Annoue, and after telling her to relax, he drew some of her mana and made a ping-pong size ball with it. He opened the ceiling door to leave any light left, but it was quite late, so there wasn't any sunlight. But there was moonlight but not too much as it was a cloudy day and wasn't too late. But it was enough for Shingi as he merged it with his Light Element mana and Annoue's mana.

He kept manipulating the moonlight as a whole and not just the mana of it, and his mana kept feeding it as a ball of light appeared in front of him and increasing its size until it was as big as his head.

The forge's fires were hot enough now as with his MANA HAND that used to open the ceiling's door, he used it to bring the sword on the fire but not entirely in there. He used some more of his Light Element mana to purify the sword of any impurities left in it, which weren't too many since it was a crafted weapon by the System, but there were quite enough since it wasn't a great quality one.

After almost a minute, one could see something rare. Shingi was sweating, something that didn't happen many times when he worked. He had adjusted his body at high temperatures during the past days, and the forge wasn't even at its highest temperature it could. The sweat was cause Shingi was pushing himself to his limits, and this time not his body but his mind.

He was using a Light Element MANA HAND to hold the sword, so he had to keep feeding it with mana cause of the damage it was getting because of the fire. But he had to do it because he wanted to pass Light Element mana to it, and it was quicker with doing it that way than using an Earth MANA HAND. It also seemed the mana was somewhat purer that way and had a more significant effect.

He also had to keep the moonlight ball in shape, which he was able to do it using some of his Earth Element mana and made a shell around it. After bringing his GLASSBLOWING skill at Base Rank, he could use his Earth Mana to make some glass when combining with a little Light Mana, and that special glass was what he used for the shell.

After almost two minutes since he started his progress at purifying the sword, he pulled it out of the forge and left it on the anvil.

He took a deep breath as he turned his attention to the moonlight ball, and after releasing it from its shell, he focused on it to change its form.

He used his right hand, having his finger closed except his index and middle ones, and started moving his arm and drawing lines in the air.

It seemed to be a complicated design of many shapes, and he kept repeating drawing it again and again as he slowly used the moonlight to this shape.

It took him almost an hour of repeating the same movement again and again as the shape which had the same height as him, was finally ready.

But it was too big to be used on the sword, so Shingi raised his hand one a high as he could and the other as low as he could and tried to make them meet each other as with that movement was shrinking his creation in front of him.

Sweat was released by Shingi's head in a significant amount like never before as this was the most difficult and most crucial part of his project. He had to keep the shape while focusing on decreasing its size, which took everything his MANA MANIPULATION skill had to offer, even if it was at Master Rank.

He finished it in less than five minutes, but it felt like it took him hours to finish it.

The final size was smaller than one would expect as it was a little bigger than his palm.

He slowly brought it towards the anvil where the sword was residing, which was still heated up a little but not too much. He put his free hand over the blade's base but didn't touch it and focused any remaining Light Element mana he had to feed the heat that was in the blade at that part. Since the fire made by air made from his mana, it was having some mana of its own so that he could do something like that.

After the blade turned redder because it was heated up enough, Shingi brought the Enchantment Circle he had created to that position and merged it with the sword.

Shingi felt some resistance because the fire's mana still in the blade and of the moonlight was rejecting each other, but with pure mental force, he was keeping everything in place.

He had a few moments that he seemed like he would pass out, but he found a way to help on it. He closed his eyes to lessen the burden of his normal senses and used his MANA SENSE only.

It proved to be better this way since what he had to keep in place was mana, so MANA SENSE was proved more useful than his eyes.

Then, when he thought that he was ready to pass out completely, he felt that there wasn't any more resistance as the merge was complete.

He stopped using all his Skills as he fell to the floor.

Everyone ran towards him, seeing him fall, but he was slowly standing up.

"I am fine. It just took a little more by me than I thought, but nothing a little break won't fix." [Shingi]

He hadn't used all his mana, but he had used all the Light Element mana he had and was close even to use one of his Mana Seeds, but he didn't have to in the end.

"So why don't you give it a test now? It should be more comfortable to use now." [Shingi]

Of course, he was looking towards Annoue while saying that, who didn't know what to say. She understood now that he did all that for her, and he pushed himself more than usual, which she didn't like one bit. She knew that her brother wasn't going to stop do things like that. She had noticed how she didn't have his arm 'trapped' when she woke up, so she was sure that he got free somehow but didn't say anything about it.

She picked up the sword, which wasn't heated up now, and gave it some more swings.

There were some improvements at her moves, and they seemed to have little more speed and force on them, and the balance between them to have improved. It seemed like a great blade can improve one's skills, but even the most exceptional item can't be used the same by everyone.

"Since I made the enchantment by using some of your mana too so will be more beneficial when used by you. I used some of your mana for the most crucial parts of it, so it will also be harder for anyone else to use it. Your Mana Weapon Skills like AIR SLASH will be much easier to use with this as you can store some of your mana in it to use later for them. There are many other interesting things, but we going to take a look at them some other time." [Shingi]

Annoue seemed amazed by it, but Shingi didn't seem to have finished with what he wanted to say.

"There is one more thing, but I will need some of your blood for this." [Shingi]

The Players seemed surprised by what he just said. Something that uses someone's blood seemed to be of some evil source to them or part of a weird ritual and such.

But Annoue didn't give it much thought, as she cut one of her fingers a little and brought it in front of Shingi.

He got some of the blood as he asked the sword and Annoue to sit down in front of him.

He put some of the blood over the sword's enchantment, which looked like it was carved on it now. He then used some more blood to draw something on Annoue's backside of her neck.

It was a circle and had a weird rune on it in a strange language that didn't look to be from the real world. It was one of the few magical runes that he knew and was confident he could use.

He used some of his mana to make the blood dry by manipulating its mana and fuel it. Some light appeared, and some heard a voice saying something in a strange language as a tattoo of the same shape replaced the dry blood.

"What was that voice?" [Mizuneko]

Shingi, Mizuneko, Little Phoenix, and Annoue were the only ones who heard the voice cause it could be heard only by one who could use mana. When one was doing a ritual like what Shingi has done, they would hear this voice, and it was rumored that it was the Goddess of Magic herself giving her blessing.

But Shingi knew that it was some of the Angels of the Goddess and not her. He learned that at one of his talks with Aella. She had told him a few of the other Gods' 'secrets' during the Quest they had over the years.

After explaining that, he turned towards Annoue.

"Try to focus some of your mana at what I drew at your neck while holding your sword." [Shingi]

She did that, and then her sword disappeared.

"What happened? Where did it go?!?" [Annoue]

"Focus some more mana on the same place, and it will be summoned at a free hand of yours. You can focus your mana on the left side more if you want it at your left hand or on the right for your right hand. Otherwise will be random if both your hand are free." [Shingi]

She focused, and the sword appeared once more held by her right hand.

She kept looking at the blade and having her other hand on the backside of her neck to feel her tattoo, but it was pretty much a part of her body, and she didn't feel any pain when she got it.

At that point, a notification appeared letting him know that his Quest was completed and was successful, and when he checked the Reward, he saw something unexpected.