--
Swish, Swish, Swish
Cedric stood on the plain with swords surrounding him in an ornate manner; his hands were clasped behind his back. Evidently, he's controlling the swords using only his thoughts.
Even though the sword case he got from the system could potentially produce an infinite number of training swords, 10 was the limit of what Cedric could take out at once. Using the sword case does consume energy, and controlling these many swords puts a mental burden on him.
Cedric stood still, and so did the swords. When he opened his eyes, the swords suddenly turned into streaks of light that flew away from him, carrying a terrifying, piercing power with them.
Sending out a thought, the swords practically teleported back near his body and encircled him with their tips facing out. They then spun, seemingly turning into a circle saw. With another thought from Cedric, they stopped again.
One sword broke away from the formation and landed on his hand. Cedric went into a stance and began performing the fundamentals of the Sword Master Chapter of the Myriad Sword Catalogue.
With each breath he released, it was accompanied by a sharp and piercing gleam of the sword. His body and the sword he's holding thrummed in joy with each move he made. Slowly but surely, the sharpness of his aura climbed steadily as he practiced his stances.
In conjunction with performing his stances, Cedric was also practicing the fundamentals of the Sword Immortal Chapter of the Myriad Sword Catalogue. The Sword Immortal Chapter was all about controlling flying swords, much like the nine training swords hovering around him since he started his training.
Even though he could only control 10 swords for now, he could perform numerous sword formations using them, and this would just increase as he gradually increased the number of swords he could control.
His current level of skills displayed the Beginner stage of comprehending the Myriad Sword Catalogue. Technically, he could've just chosen either the Sword Master Chapter or the Sword Immortal Chapter to specialize in, but Cedric decided to train in both.
He's not being muddle-headed by doing this. And if his assumptions were correct, he's neither the first nor the last person to have done this. The Myriad Sword Catalogue is the fundamental sword skill within the alliance; it's not surprising for anybody that someone would want to master it to its fullest, and Cedric was no different.
Cedric's current level of strength was enough to reach the Intermediate Stage of the Myriad Sword Catalogue. He just needed more time to practice it.
Once Cedric had enough of his warm-up, he decided to take his practice up a notch.
He mobilized his energies, which had been converted into Bright Yang Energy due to the influence of the Nine Suns Empyrean Codex. The flare of his energy resonated with the swords, causing bright golden flames to cover each sword. As Cedric focused, the flames condensed, and their heat rose at an alarming rate.
Now, aside from the terrifying sharpness of the training swords, they also carry the annihilating heat of Sunfire. This essentially doubled their lethality.
The sword on Cedric's hand showed a stronger reaction to his energy because it's in direct contact with him. Nevertheless, be it this one or the flying swords, both just made Cedric extremely dangerous.
Cedric carried on with his training with this. In addition, he's also performing the Heavenly Shrinking Steps, which also reached the beginner stage.
"I think that my progress would be faster if I could test my progress against someone."
Cedric sighed and decided that he shouldn't think too much about this for now.
**
"Oh, so this is the new guy! He really is hairless!"
Cedric swallowed whatever he wanted to say in reply to that. Instead, he looked at the speaker just now and was surprised by what he saw.
"Greetings!" The challenger said, thumping his chest and emitting a low growl, which should be their way of greeting someone. Cedric could tell because of the emoji that floated beside his speaker's head when he did that.
"I'm Howler, member of the Werewolf Clan."
Howler is a bipedal wolf with a human-like torso. He's about 8 feet tall and has lush gray fur. There is a long scar on his left eye and a claw scar on his chest. He's wearing a bone-teeth necklace and a pair of pants.
"Sorry for staring." Cedric averted his eyes and bowed slightly. "Hello, I'm Dawnbringer, a human."
"A human, eh?" Howler looked interested. "I haven't heard of your kind before, and how surprising that you can speak my language."
"I..." Cedric blinked; he then looked shocked and mildly terrified. "I guess I do. Damn, it happened again."
Cedric really had no idea how this was happening subconsciously to him. Didn't he have perfect control over his body? Why couldn't he control this?
"You must be the first of your kind to arrive here, then," said someone who's standing beside Howler. "Did the system ask you to register your racial identity when you first came here?"
Cedric nodded to that, and once again, he could understand this person's language, which further added to his confusion.
"Oh, well...then that checks out." He said, "Ah, I'm called Backpack Fatty, by the way. Nice to meet you, Dawnbringer."
"Nice to meet you too...?" Cedric observed himself as he tried to reply to Backpack Fatty with the same language, and once again, he's shocked that he could do this.
Backpack Fatty tilted his head and asked, "Oh, you know my language too?"
"No," Cedric decisively replied, and with a wry smile, he said, "Would you believe me if I said that this is my first time hearing and speaking it? I don't understand how either."
"Oho...how interesting."