Chương 8: Art - 7

After 5 hours, I found my way out of the cave.

Without even hesitating, I jumped off of the edge of the cave into the darkness of the abyss.

'Please, please, please, please let it still be there.'

I started dropping faster and faster as the light of the day faded from view above me.

I kept falling for a few minutes before I felt something slowing down my descent.

It was a naturally forming air current that had been siphoned through the twist and turns of the caverns scattered about the cliffs face.

As that current passed, another one took its place and then other, slowing my descent to only a few meters a second now.

With this slowed down pace, my descent continued.

...

Finally, my feet touched the soft floor at the bottom of the canyon.

"Whew, finally."

I immediately started running towards a part of the canyon covered in storm clouds, incessant lightning lighting up the grayness.

Reaching the edge of the clouds, I waited for a certain moment, when 10 lightning flashes happened in succession.

Seeing the signal, I started.

3 steps forward.

2 steps to the right.

1 step back.

2 steps to the left.

4 steps forward.

Repeat.

Again.

...

After following this particular pattern for a few hours, I finally emerged on the other side of the stormy area.

What I had just passed through was the "Storm Canyon", famous by explorers for being an area that was perpetually struck by lightning from unmoving storm clouds.

In this canyon, one wrong step could lead to certain death.

The particular trick that I had used had been information that I had thought was useless when I had read about it in the auxiliary volume, but it was now extremely handy as I needed that art at the end of this canyon.

Well, there were actually two arts at the end of this canyon, but because of what I wanted my profession to be, I didn't need the other art, so I could only hope that whoever took the sword art out of the caverns had taken the other art, the one I didn't need.

After all, the art that I wanted had a really big downside to it, so not a lot of people would want it, but the benefits outweighed the downsides.

I ran farther until I reached an area with even softer soil.

Seeing a hole in the ground ahead, I could only pray.

'So they did go and get one of the manuals here.'

I started digging a hole in the area next to the original one.

After I got about 5 meters down, my hand brushed something metallic.

I hurriedly sunk my hands into the soil surrounding it and then heaved the metal tablet out of the sand.

I could only smile as I looked at the description on the art.

'Thank god they took the other art.'

With the choices that the other person had done so far, I could roughly guess that they were aiming to be a magic swordsman, like the protagonist of this novel, as they had taken the 8-star sword art in the cavern and had taken the "Silent Casting" art that had been buried next to the one that I wanted.

Because I had no desire to do anything with magic, except for my sound magic, I really didn't need the silent casting as sound magic didn't rely on incantations, instead operating on the usage of injecting the sound type mana into an instrument.

Not wasting a moment, I injected my spiritual energy into the art in front of me, dissolving the tablet as particles of light flew into my head.

As I still didn't have one of the special crystals that let me see my status, I couldn't check the exact information of the art, but I could already feel the changes in my mind as I became extremely irritable at my surroundings.

Well first, I had to explain the difference between an art, a skill, and a manual.

The difference between a skill and a manual was pretty self explanatory, you learned a skill immediately after absorbing the skill book while you had to learn, step by step, each "form" in a manual.

An art was like a skill, with differences in its form of creation and differences in what exactly could be made into an art.

A skill and a manual were both things dropped by a person upon death whilst an art was something that any 8-star or above person could create from their own techniques by imbuing their spiritual energy and will into a special metal tablet, at the cost of a permanent loss of the amount of spiritual power that they had used in creating the art.

Also, skills were ranked from from (F-) to (SS) rank whilst arts and manuals followed the star ranking system.

My particular art was originally a failed art that came from the creator's desire at the end of his life to create the silent casting art, but they had accidentally thought about the wrong thing whilst imbuing their will into the tablet, creating the art of "OCD" instead of the art of "Silent Casting".

So, you might be thinking, "What the heck is OCD good for?" well, it was actually something that was really good when you thought about it.

With OCD, I could easily figure out any superfluous movements when I was practicing a manual, vastly decreasing the amount of time I spent on each star rank if I could easily figure out what I was doing wrong.

I would also always know where everything was, and I could also plan bigger schemes with more organization, creating a higher rate of success.

Of course, the only downside would be I would get irritated at almost anything that wasn't perfect, so I would need to learn to have more control over my new impulses.

Satisfied with what I had gained today, I immediately focused my spiritual energy into my arms and hands, basically turning them into climbing hooks that dug deep into the sides of the canyon, as I started climbing out.

I immediately ran to the train station and booked the next train to my final destination, rushing as I had spent 4 days in Noverus, which was way too much time.

I was finally able to relax on the train, immediately drifting into a much needed deep sleep.

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A/N: So, a lot of my friends are complaining that there is no plot yet, so I just wanted to say that yes, I know that there is no plot yet, but I promise that the plot will start after chapter 10. I mean, just give me a few more days to complete the world building before I dive into the plot so that their are no plot holes later on in the story.