[Voidknight Ascension] Chapter 79: A Gift Received

“Some serious honkers, huh?” Komachi snickered as they waited for the scholar to come to the door.

“A real set of bodonkers,” Sam agreed, continuing the joke.

That got Komachi into it. “Packin’ some dobon honkeros!”

The ridiculous bit went so far that at some point it sounded like they were just making noises at one another.

“Okay, okay, I think the bit’s run its course,” Sam finally said to Komachi.

“It’s awesome I can make jokes with you now.”

“Instead of just cat noises? Yeah.” Sam scratched her under her furry white chin.

The demon scholar opened the door and stared at each of his guests. It was pretty clear he’d been listening on the other side of the door. “…yes? How may I be of service?”

Sam held up the pizza box. “Brought some food,” he explained. “Figured you would be hungry and maybe want to see a friendly face. I’m Sam.” He extended his free hand.

Tentatively watching him in case Sam sprouted horns or something, the demon gently grasped and shook his hand. Sam was surprised at how soft the man’s skin was.

Scholars, even demonic ones, probably don’t get out much.

“And this is Komachi,” Sam added, hiking his thumb at the cat on his shoulder.

Friendly as ever, she waved her paw.

“I am Bal’daz.” He gave a gentle grin and tried to shake hands with Komachi as well, though he looked quite bewildered about it.

Komachi lifted her paw daintily and shook paw to hand with Bal’daz.

Then, like a true introvert, he took the pizza and shut the door, murmuring a half-hearted apology about getting back to work.

Sam looked over at Komachi. “It’s a good thing we already ate, huh?”

They turned around and headed back toward the battlefield. Sam wasn’t about to impose and he didn’t want to press the poor devil to open up just yet.

Besides, there were more important things to do. And he had at least introduced himself and gotten a name. That was better than nothing.

Sam strolled across the field of ash and broken weapons, most of which were either also returned to ash or so barbaric that he didn’t think he could make any use of them.

Most of them weren’t even made out of metal. He had been scanning, trying to use his Metal affinity to see if he might be able to collect them and smelt them down somehow.

It was becoming clear to Sam that he needed to think outside of the box about how everything worked.

Usually, you would just go to the store to pick something up, but there were no stores here. So, if they really wanted to make a go of living here, they needed to go back to the basics.

And some of the most basic building blocks of the modern world were wood, stone, and metal. But to use that wood or stone, you needed metal.

Aside from the obvious things like nails and other fasteners that made everything stay up, you needed tools to work the raw materials. Punching a tree might work, but it would be arduous and annoying.

Chopping it down with a sword might also work, but he was willing to bet there was some sort of penalty for doing it the “wrong way” that the Shard would impose.

Still, with his Strength, he bet it was at least a viable alternative.

Not that Sam had the first clue how to smelt anything. You needed a hot enough fire, that much he knew, but once you got into the specifics of how you melted something without it just… running everywhere, that was when Sam’s knowledge broke down.

Still, he took the time to search through and loot anything that might be of use. Not only because he could get first picks but also because Raiko had made an off-handed comment that oni sometimes dropped good loot.

And there were a lot of dead oni.

Thankfully, they had the decency to self-immolate upon death.

Otherwise, the land would have been covered in carrion-feeders. And while that would be bad enough on Earth, he imagined they would be massive here and might not quibble about adding a living creature to the mountain of dead.

Plus, there was the smell. Nobody ever thought of the smell. There was a faint sulfurous stink in the air, but other than that, it was relatively fine.

No blood, no viscera. Fairly clean as all things went, aside from the scattering ash that blew away in thin dark streamers.

Disposing of all those demon bodies would have been grim work, though at least they could have thrown them over the side of the Skyshard.

He wondered if there was truly anything below them. Was everybody just dumping all of their trash over the side of their Skyshard? Wouldn’t the bottom just be a massive pile of refuse that would eventually form some sort of hellish landmass?

Sam shook his head to dislodge the strange thoughts and continued searching. He didn’t have a great eye for treasure, but his [Treasure Hunter] seemed to help, drawing his eye to something he could have easily passed over.

There were a few notable finds. A katana with a manatuned enchantment on it, but its condition was in a terrible state. A bow that kept catching itself on fire and rattling on the ground, which was just plain weird.

The best of the bunch was one of the shaman’s staves, being Uncommon rarity with strange enhancements on it. By the description, it was stolen from another dimensional plane. So it wasn’t demonic by design.

Nothing he could use, but maybe Matt would like it. He held onto it just in case.

Sam was starting to see a trend here. Anything good wasn’t created by these hellsent. They were stolen.

The other wasn’t actually a weapon, although he might be able to manage it if he truly had to. One of the chains that was used to hook into this Skyshard was left mostly intact. That was both a huge source of metal, if it could be broken down, and otherwise fairly strong.

The dullahan that offered him that giant weapon earlier remained fixed in place, exactly where he left it. He almost felt bad for leaving it this long, but the dullahan didn’t seem to mind.

As soon as he approached, the dullahan seemed to sense his presence—he still wasn’t sure how they sensed the world—and lifted the sword a little higher on its upturned palms.

The thing was massive. Larger even than the [Shatterblade] had been, and far larger than his [Charred Claymore].

[Dullahan Greatsword]

(Colossal Greatsword) (F-Class)

(★☆Uncommon II)

Enhancements

Slashing Damage V | Swing Speed I

Impact Damage III

Imbuements

Metal Mana

Impact Mana

The dullahan’s spirit of bravery that once wielded this sword now lives on in this weapon. The wide blade, spanning considerable length, broadens into a top-heavy crescent blade suitable for slashing attacks. Too heavy and large for most humans to wield, except those that command exceptional strength and skill.

Requires: >100 Strength

[Greatsword Foundation] (★Common)

And unlike his [Charred Claymore], it wasn’t busted up.

As Uncommon rarity, it was of comparable power to his Thanas armor. Despite how he had changed the [Charred Claymore] with his [Archflame Coal], enhancing it with fire damage, it simply could not compare to a vastly stronger weapon.

There was only so much you could do to make a weak weapon better. Eventually, the quality of its base components became a limiting factor.

Sam paused. Where the hell did that thought come from?

It sure as hell wasn’t his own. He hardly thought like that. But he was sure it was true.

Maybe it was his [Basic Maintenance] or even his Metal affinity working. Weird.

However, the [Dullahan Greatsword’s] sheer size and immense weight would make it significantly more challenging to wield.

Maybe that’ll push my skill even further?  Wonder how slow it is.

“Is that thing bigger than you?” Komachi asked, tilting her head.

“Almost,” Sam said, lifting it above his head and giving it a few test swings to the side. It sang through the air, but something was wrong.

It strained his arms to hold it, which wasn’t a surprise considering its massive size. It made his [Charred Claymore] look like a toothpick by comparison.

However, Sam felt that he was only just able to wield it. So what was going on?

He tried posing the question to the dullahan, but it didn’t respond. Instead, once it was sure that Sam had the weapon in hand, it turned and joined its brethren in standing guard around the bamboo grove that led into the Sacred Tree’s area.

“Nice talking to you,” Sam called after it.

With a grunt of effort, Sam hefted the weapon up onto his free shoulder and then tried to slash it through the air in a sloppy Zornhau maneuver. He could do it, but he fumbled the recovery, nearly dropping the sword in the process.

What the hell?

Curious, Sam stabbed the sword into the ground and began stripping off pieces of armor until his total Strength fell below 100.

“Raiko ain’t here,” Komachi pointed out. “Why you strippin’?”

“Testing a theory.”

Once Sam was below 100 Strength, he reached over to the large blade and pulled with all of his might. He managed to lift it up into the air but only just, and all the while his arms were trembling with the strain of it.

I think I get it now.

He dropped it. The blade slotted itself into the same hole it had carved into the earth before, and Sam donned his equipment again.

“I think if you have equipment that gives you extra stats, you can use items that require a certain threshold,” Sam explained. “So with equipment like mine that gives over 100 total Strength, I can technically wield this weapon.”

Komachi leapt atop the hilt of the greatsword and gave the weapon a curious sniff. Her attention turned back to him.

“But, it’s not true Strength,” he continued. “Somehow the Shard knows the difference. Without the total amount of Strength required, I can’t even wield the [Dullahan Greatsword]. But I’m willing to bet if my actual core Strength was over 100, I’d have no problem. As it is, I’m about 12 points shy.”

“Just 12? Dang!”

Sam nodded. “With all my bonuses, not including equipment, I have 88 Strength. So about 3 levels of Swordsman should do the trick to bump me over that hurdle. For now, with my artificial Strength over 100, I can wield the sword, but I can’t use it effectively.”

“Are you going to, then? It does seem a lot stronker. Er, Machi means stronger.”

Sam shook his head. “It’s not reliable. I would be opening myself up to all sorts of danger if I kept using it like this. Unless it was strong enough to let me one-shot most things, it would be too easy for any monster to get around my guard after dodging the strike. It’s the recovery after the strike that I can’t control.”

He would rather have consistent, if weaker, results than something that he could only control part of the time. Besides, how hard could getting 3 more Swordsman levels be?

“What’cha wanna do now then?” Komachi scanned their surroundings. “Explore around this Skyshard, or go rest some more?”

“I’ve done enough resting already,” Sam said, eager to do something more. “Let’s go see what our new home has in store for us. But first, I want to get back to my Skyshard.”

He shaded his eyes and looked up.

There it was, floating like a small moon above… well, nothing. The chunk of land that he had come down onto was gone. Thankfully, the Skyshard had moved farther mauka, toward the center of the Skyshard.

Now that Sam had a good long look at the horizon, he had the sinking feeling that the Skyshard was smaller than he remembered.

Komachi squinted. “Sure hope the mandys don’t poop, cause we’re right in the—”

Something dropped, whistling all the way.

It was brown.

It exploded.

Sam’s legs were covered in a strange, pulpy material. “—Splash zone?” Sam finished for her.

“Yis. Nyahm, nyahm, nyahm… Tastes sweet.”

It faintly smelled of coconut.

Shaking the pulp off his legs, Sam went in search of the trailing [Makeshift Rope] he hoped was still dangling from his Skyshard.