Sword God in a World of Magic

A couple of minutes later, Shang left the Caves and went to where Jerald was currently.

Jerald simply handed Shang several large books, and Shang left for the Caves again.

As soon as he came back, Shang read through all the books.

These books were Spell Compendiums, and they basically listed every standard True Mage Spell known to the Skythunder Kingdom.

Something like that would go for an extraordinary price, but Jerald just gave them to Shang.

Sure, these Spell Compendiums were extremely valuable, but their value was still perceived in gold.

Shang could hunt True Path Stage beasts. If he wanted to repay Jerald, he would only need to hand over a single corpse, and he would have repaid far more than he owed.

Naturally, Shang wasn't interested in learning Magic. He only looked at the Spells and how they worked to gain inspiration for his techniques.

Shang was no longer on a level where he needed to learn other people's techniques. No, he needed to create his own techniques.

Additionally, with Shang's powerful Path, he was more than qualified to create such techniques.

Over the next two years, Shang's Path didn't make much progress. He was fully focused on coming up with new techniques and trying to manipulate his Mana and Affinities well enough to actually use them.

He created a couple of duds, but he also found a couple of useful ones.

After coming up with a good framework for his future fighting style, Shang went on to make his new fighting style an actual reality.

The beginning was hard since this was a new field for Shang.

Three years later, Shang had only made marginal progress.

At least, that was how it felt.

When Shang actually looked at the Star Map, he noticed something.

The Shards that had symbolized Shang's different Affinities were starting to connect to Shang's Paths.

This didn't increase the actual progress of his Path but made it wider and more powerful.

By now, all four Paths were even wider than Mervin's Path, showing their ridiculous power.

Shang realized that he was onto something big, and his determination to continue pursuing this path only increased.

Five years later, Shang managed to fully integrate his Affinities with his Paths.

In the last ten or so years, Shang's Path hadn't advanced upward but had gotten far wider.

Right now, Shang's Path was still stuck at a bit more than 50%, but it couldn't be compared to its earlier version.

From this point onward, Shang focused on progressing his Path again with its new width.

Over the past couple of years, even more True Path Stage warriors and High Mages appeared.

Sadly, the number of deaths amongst the True Path Stage warriors rose.

They started to be sent on reckless missions or just mysteriously vanished.

Most of all, the warriors that died were all warriors that were not too happy with the Mages.

warriors started to realize that

simply didn't have the power to go against

there was something

appeared on the critical frontlines, even when great rewards

didn't go beyond. They

public. When nobody knew that

they had given up on

respect them, they also wouldn't show

the frontlines between the Skythunder

pressure on the Skythunder Kingdom increased, and the Council was forced

way to announce such a

now that they were no longer

were changing in the world over the years,

in the

now, Count Sword had been

him, but he was

only a very powerful and talented Peak Commander Stage warrior. By now, there were many Early True Path Stage warriors and even a couple

even a couple of warriors that reached Mervin's

Count Sword actually

then, but would

if that guy actually were so powerful, why wasn't he at the True Path Stage yet? Wouldn't he have shown himself? True Path Stage warriors needed resources and experience. Wouldn't he

Shang knew about all of this, he

working on

day by day, and Shang could see the sheer power his Path

remained deep in the

years later, some bad

Ranos had died.

been

deep breath

the future he had

the few

he could do

most important thing to

year later, Soran

also most likely

never truly been Shang's biggest fan, but it was still sad to see one

Viera, had been sent to

had gone overboard while hunting beasts and had

wouldn't

Council was systematically getting rid of all the important people in

later, Teacher Niria

the one that gave Shang the quota for the Day of

her in

year later,

hit

heir, and he

powerful Peak Commander Stage warrior and a powerful

probably been the most powerful person in

had

powerful, and he

was the biggest

died, he had never

needed a

after the other left Jerald's life,