The Anomaly's Path

The weight on my knees was the only thing keeping me grounded. I sat in the center of the jungle, the sword across my lap, and realized I hadn’t even named the damn thing yet.

The sun was trying its best to poke through the thick canopy, casting jagged, shifting shadows across the moss.

I looked down at the blade Torben had given me. It was not the custom masterpiece he had promised, but it was miles better than the sharpened branch I had been swinging around.

The blade was shorter than a standard longsword, with a gentle, wicked curve that caught the dim light.

The steel was dark—not polished or shiny, but a dull, tempered grey that looked like it had seen its fair share of blood. The hilt was wrapped in old, hardened leather, worn smooth by some nameless sellsword’s grip.

It was heavy. Solid. Real.

”You need a name,” I muttered, my voice sounding small against the backdrop of the massive trees.

Calling it ’the sword’ felt wrong. Just like Torben said, swords were more than just tools. They were extensions of the user. If I was going to survive this hellhole, I could not just treat this like a piece of sharpened iron.

I ran a thumb along the flat of the blade. It was cold.

”How about... Midnight? No, too edgy. Ghost? Nah.” I tilted my head, thinking back to the estate, back to the life I had left behind. Then, a face popped into my head. A glitchy, annoying, glowing face.

Nova.

I let out a dry, jagged laugh that turned into a wince as my ribs protested. ”Damn bastard,” I whispered. ”I wonder if you are still stuck in that void, or if you have found someone else to annoy with your ’tutorial’ prompts. I miss you, you glitchy mess.”

I really did miss that ball of light. More than I wanted to admit. If he were here, he would probably be telling me my naming sense was a Rank-E tragedy.

”...Fine,” I said, gripping the hilt. ”Until Torben finishes the real one, you are Stray. But for now, I’ll call you Nova.”

I stood up slowly. My body felt stiff, but the weeks of training had hardened me. I was not the soft noble who had tumbled into the river anymore. I was thinner, scarred, and my eyes felt sharper.

I held the sword in front of me, point toward the sky, and closed my eyes. I could feel my core, that small knot of mana lodged somewhere behind my ribs. Thin. Weak. But there.

How did I push mana into the blade?

In theory, infusing mana into a weapon should be simple. The mana was there, sitting in my core, waiting to be used. I just had to push it. Guide it. Let it flow.

I thought about what I knew from the game.

Mana was fuel. It powered everything—skills, techniques, reinforcement. But using it in a weapon was not like using it for Starlight Steps or Flash Instinct. Those skills had paths already built, channels the mana knew how to follow. This was different. This was raw.

”...Okay,” I muttered, closing my eyes. ”Focus.”

I breathed in, deep and slow. I tried to focus. Do not just think about the sword, I told myself. Feel the mana in your chest. It is a pool. A reservoir. Now, push it.

I imagined the mana as a liquid, thick and warm, sitting right behind my core. I tried to grab it with my mind. It was slippery, like trying to hold onto an eel in a bucket of oil.

I gritted my teeth. Move, you stubborn shit.

I focused on the connection between my hand and the leather grip. I visualized a pipe running down my arm, through my palm, and into the steel. I pushed.

At first, nothing happened. Just the sound of the wind and my own heartbeat. Then, I felt a pulse. A jolt of heat that traveled from my shoulder down to my fingertips.

I opened my eyes and gasped.

Huff... huff...

The dark steel was not dark anymore. A thin, flickering layer of pale blue light was clinging to the edge. It was faint—barely there—but it was vibrating. The air around the blade hummed.

”Ha!” I let out a manic grin. ”I knew it. I am a genius.”

It was slow, and maintaining it felt like trying to balance a plate on a stick while running, but it worked. I was actually channeling mana into a weapon.

I took a stance—low, centered, the way I had seen the elite guards do back at the estate. I swung.

Swoosh!

The blade cut through the air with a whistle I had never heard from my wooden stick. I stepped toward a sapling, maybe three inches thick, and brought the sword down in a diagonal slash.

There was no resistance.

The mana-coated steel slid through the wood like it was warm butter. The top half of the tree slid off silently, hitting the moss with a soft thud. The cut was perfectly smooth.

”Okay,” I breathed, my heart racing. ”That is the fuel. Now... the flavor.”

In the game, mana was the base, but affinities were what turned a player into a god. Mana was the raw material, nothing more than fuel waiting to be spent.

But affinities?

They were the shape you gave it.

A sword strike with mana behind it hit harder. A sword strike with lightning behind it hit faster, deeper, like the edge was finding places it should not be able to reach. It was not just power—it was physics.

The burn of fire, the weight of ice, the speed of lightning. All of it layered on top of the steel, making it more than it was.

I closed my eyes again, reaching deeper. Beyond the pool of mana in my chest, there was something else. It felt like a spark-gap in an engine. A sharp, prickly sensation that made the hairs on my arms stand up.

I can feel them somewhere deep in there, I thought. I just need a push. I need to bridge the gap and wake them up.

I held the sword out with my right hand and placed the index and middle fingers of my left hand against the flat of the blade.

I did not just push mana this time. I looked for that prickly feeling. I looked for the static. I remembered the feeling of a storm rolling in, the smell of ozone, the way the air gets heavy right before a bolt hits the ground.

Give me the spark!

A jolt shot through my fingers. It was not warm like the mana; it was sharp. It was a needle-prick of pure energy that made my vision white for a split second.

I did not pull back. I leaned into it.

”Come on...” I hissed through clenched teeth.

Suddenly, a crackle echoed through the clearing.

I opened my eyes and stared. My jaw nearly hit the dirt.

The sword was covered in arcs of black lightning. It was not the bright, yellow-white stuff you see in cartoons. This was dark—like ink mixed with electricity. It danced along the edge of the blade, snapping and hissing, throwing tiny black sparks into the moss.

It was not just a tiny spark. It was awake. My rank was low, so it was not a massive storm, but the power was concentrated. It was useful. It was dangerous.

I stepped toward a fallen, rotting log and swung the sword without even thinking.

CRACK—BOOM!

I did not even feel the blade hit the wood. The black lightning exploded on contact. The log did not just break; it shattered. Pieces of blackened, smoking wood flew in every direction. A small crater was left in the dirt where the tip of the blade had grazed the earth.

I stood there, panting, the sword still humming in my hand. My arms were shaking from the strain, and my core felt like I had just run a marathon, but I could not stop laughing.

”HAHAHA! You seeing this, Nova?” I shouted at the empty trees. ”Look at the progress! I am not just a dramatic piece of driftwood anymore!”

I spent the next few hours pushing myself. I practiced the stances, trying to keep the lightning active while moving.

Every time I moved, the black arcs followed the trail of the blade, leaving charred lines in the air for a fraction of a second. I cut down two more dead trees, testing the output. Each strike felt more natural, the movements finally beginning to sync with the weight of the steel.

By the time the sun started to dip below the horizon, I was a mess. My clothes were soaked in sweat, my nose was leaking a bit of blood from the mana strain, and my muscles felt like they were made of lead.

But I felt alive.

I walked back to the village, my legs heavy but steady. I stopped by Roran’s shack on the way. He was sitting on his porch, a bottle in one hand and a piece of wood he was lazily whittling in the other.

”Hey,” I called out, leaning against the fence.

”You look like hell,” he said.

”That’s because I trained.”

”I can see that.”

I stood there for a moment, the words sitting in my throat. Then: ”So... will you train me now?”

”...”

He did not say anything. Just looked at me with those tired eyes.

”I am not giving up,” I said. ”I will ask you every day if I have to. I will wear you down eventually.”

He snorted. ”Stubborn little shit.”

”That is what they tell me.”

He shook his head, but there was something in his expression that was not quite annoyance. Something that looked almost like... something.

”...No.”

”Tomorrow, then.”

He did not answer. But he did not say no either.

I turned and walked back toward the orphanage.

Dinner was loud. Lily was trying to steal Tobin’s bread, Sera was pretending not to watch, and Mia was threatening to ban them both from dessert if they did not behave. I sat at the table and let the noise wash over me, my hand resting on the sword at my hip.

Marta caught my eye from across the room and smiled. I smiled back.

After dinner, I went to my room, laid the sword on the bed, and stared at it for a long time. Old steel. Dark. Notched near the tip. It did not look like anything special. But it was mine. It had a name. And today, it had held lightning.

I lay down, closed my eyes, and let sleep take me.

Tomorrow, I would try again.