Just after the disturbing noises of the Knight clapping, she continued. She stuttered as she tried to hide her joy, as strange as it was, she was filled with a joy she had thought impossible. But since all that she's been doing since the Knight got here was cry and wallow in her emotions, so she chose to continue speaking to hide the glee in her voice.
"The day that I told Eruil about the conversation, is the very same day we left my hometown on an exploit. The exploits main objectives was to gather those who could one day unleash, as we ourselves did, and find ways for all of us to grow even more powerful.
I packed my things; put the sword in a special chamber of sorts I made in my bag. I then said my goodbyes at my parents graves, as sweet as they were, they had died long before I unleashed. I missed them, and in that thought I bid them farewell.
I had the solemn wish that through some miraculous truth, I would find a way to bring you back. I never could, but still, I believed in a tale from ancient about a sword named Excalibur, and told myself, that you'd be brought back but lost your memories. I started telling people, the one who could wield it was the hero I was searching for.
Even going as far as to make it the symbol of our march, the other two didn't have a problem with it anyway. And as the fragmented soul had requested, we called ourselves Knights. Your fragmented soul said that this identity made it easier for people to know about us and follow our teachings with discipline. Later we changed it to Order of Knights.
This was of course before the sword started consuming those who touched it. In my clouded judgement, I didn't stop even then, instead I just made it harder to get access to it. I only stopped just a few thousand years ago. Can you believe that even with all those lives on my hands, I still wasn't willing to put the sword away from prying eyes?"
Lerva remembered how little the guilt of all those lives lost mattered to her. For in the end, it wasn't her idea to put it away. The other Laurels shared a deep connection with her, even with their nature, they also chose not to hide it away, but instead put in the hallway, where it would garner far less attention.
Every day, she found time to just stare at the blade, and now Backster was here, but she was having some trouble facing him, so she again chose to just finish the story.
"In our adventures we went from town to town, gathering people. But with the sheer strength we demonstrated, people joined without hesitation. We quickly grew too large, and not a single one of the recruits had unleashed. Vanarus said we should only take the strong, but Eruil argued that I used to be fragile, yet by all means I was the fourth ever human to unleash, so everyone had the potential.
Instead, I proposed, we hunkered down and built an academy, where instead of travelling, they came to us. Luckily, they both already knew a great place. Soon enough we were accepting people from across the world. As understaffed as we were, four decades later one of them unleashed. It would be another six decade before another ten unleashed.
By the end of the century, fourteen of us had unleashed. Eruil was level 34, Vanarus, 32, and I was at level 29, unable to see something to allow my skill to evolve again after level 20. But as you foretold, and as you had lead and I followed, I made sure to make some of the new unleashed have children, most were already lovers anyway.
The children were born unleashed. Now the number of unleashed grew exponentially. But having taken a shortcut, it was harder for them to just level up. That was a way better trade off.
One day on another journey, Eruil was passing a town that had been besieged. I had told her that you warned against doing anything rash. But she was told that some had not escaped the town before her, and feeling powerful, she jumped into the fray. Ten minutes later, she came out with five people in her arms.
She had a very ultra rare skill for her special skill; we didn't know it to be that rare back then. [Truth]. This skill was unlike senses; it allowed her to create her own truths. She was not walking in a straight line because the line was straight, it was because she trusted that she was walking in a straight line, and regardless of what her senses told her, this was true.
She had even gotten another skill, the first recorded instance of the [Savior] skill, similar to your [Hero] skill. Not just that people started calling her hero, she also went on to inspire many. One of the early authors who documented these early times created a guild, and the ranking system, and contrary to what people thought, he put Eruil at the very bottom of this at G-rank, I laughed when I realised I wasn't even ranked yet.
This was supposed to be good news. We had a hero, hero Eruil. Vanarus didn't like this, but it just motivated him. He also wanted to charge into the darkness and start saving people, but there was nothing that prepared us for the truths to come from Eruil.
When Eruil came back, she didn't even flinch at the mention of her hero status. She had changed. Eruil had always been a bit passionate and riled up, but now she was empty, I swore her hair had become slightly grey. I didn't expect this of humanity's most powerful human.
She had this distant look, when I asked she spoke to me about experiencing a horror unlike any other. I eventually surmised something from all this. First before that I realised that after unleashing, my IQ was roughly translated as knowledge stats. I was at a high level 193, and by now, I could formulate processes faster. I had lived for over a hundred years, but as young as ever, so I had ample time to grow my capabilities.
Eruil had actually grown strong enough, in fact I think that everyone that had unleashed had learned of something strange. Being qualified of power meant that our senses were strong enough to perceive the darkness. She was just the first of many who would suffer this fate.
We had come to take power as a percentage, and we believed at 100, we would be at a high enough percentage to face the darkness, so we bid our time. Eruil, me and Vanarus, just kept pushing, making sure to remain cautious. Meanwhile, hope spread far and wide at the mention of a hero, and the much-skepticized ranking system.
Ironically, now that we had unleashed, we were more in more danger than ever when it came to facing the darkness. Taking the news as is, I published my findings, this instantly made many turn their backs at this levelling up. Learning that being more powerful came at the cost of experiencing the darkness in 4K resolution was an unwelcomed truth. Only a few stayed, at the very least, this made our lessons more effective and efficient before the incident happened."
Again, Lerva took a break from speaking, she was reliving her failures.
"I was practically the smartest human alive at the time, but I failed to see what came next. Our students sometimes failed to heed our warnings, and a few of them, Agelia, Fonri, Adoi, and Sula, went on such an adventure. At this time, all of them were F-rank (level 41-50), Eruil and us were already at D-rank (level 61-70), but we struggled to do what needed to be done.
All four of them came back, as horrific beasts, deranged, and burdened with madness. We couldn't even register their faces. Everyone called them monsters as they rampaged at will. Eruil denied it with her whole being, saying they were nothing like the creatures of the darkness, everyone agreed, all military records proved it, but then what were they? and could they be fixed?
That is when I remembered what you called those in the darkness, 'Destroyers'. So, from then onwards, I renamed all those of the darkness destroyers, and the ones roaming the world monsters. We captured three of them, Eruil had to regrettably take the life of one of her promising students, Agelia had a skill making her capture impossible.
At this time, we also began to enforce greater entry requirements for the Order of Knights. Vanarus created the protocols, and the philosophies based on the first knight, you, and our own lessons from when we first begun and learned to unleash.
In due time, we became an established organization, this lead to the creation of others. The guilds, merchants, and on my merit, the researchers – I believed I shouldn't be the only one developing their mind at such an outrageous pace, sharing our findings amongst each other, establishing the tradition.
On my three hundredth birthday, I reached level 91, Vanarus was level 93, and for the first time in human history, we had our first A-rank, Eruil at level 100. She chose to wait for us to reach what we thought was the pinnacle before we finally began the fight in earnest.
This was a milestone in human history. Humanity celebrated this for ages and ages. Festivities that went on for days. But something happened, she reached level 101. Sure, we kept this a secret until we ourselves understood it. At this point, I realised, if levels weren't a percentage, we didn't know how hight they claimed.
The man who had originally come up with the ranks was long gone, so when Eruil revealed her level to the people, many clamoured to create these new ranks. They had lost meaning, but in their place, they brought an awareness. They made us realise we had grown stronger, much stronger than expected, but made us ask if it was enough?
Eruil believed this more than most, but spent her time idle, meditating, she was certain that as she was now, power was but a thought away, just like special skills when we were level 9. She was having trouble though, so I quickly rose to above level 100 myself to help her.
As every strategy failed, one after the other, I had to find a way to define the power within our constraints. I asked Vanarus and Eruil, what exactly are we trying to gain control over?
We came to realise since we had gained control over ourselves the next thing was to gain control over the world around us. When that failed, we tried to gain control over just a piece of it, settling on just a property.
I was trying to gain control over thoughts, but it being so subjective, I thought I could become the memorial keeper of people instead, so I chose memories. Memories were nice and all, but the real reason was to one day be able to restore your memories if you lost them, but in the end your blade restored them not me."
Lerva once again looked at the knight, trying to see if the Knight would give her a look of an obsessed child, but the Knight, even with Backster's memories found nothing particularly of note about dedicating ones life to one thing, it had dedicated everything to finding the sword if not but a few days ago when it found it.
"Anyway, Eruil chose to have full subjugation of change, Vanarus, chose consequence. We all had an image of what we thought we were going to have authority over, but we didn't quite do, and just like what Eruil said, just as we exerted ourselves fully, we gained control. Sure, there was some resistance, but we gained control!"
She flared with emotions, remembering the wander she had when she saw Eruil and Vanarus use her power.
"The power [Consequence] allowed Vanarus to assign misaligned consequences to different actions, like healing oneself when they were supposed to incur an injury. His power was versatile but extremely draining to use. It immediately showed the students and unfortunately those turned monsters, the critical difference between skills and powers.
The power [Change] perhaps became one of the most impossible powers to ever be. Till today, no-one else has succeeded in gaining this specific power. Eruil went on to show humanity with this power, that change had arrived, and as a hero she would usher it. This elevated her to one of the three heroes of legend as in the stories, because she fundamentally changed the course of humanity.
Her power gave her unbelievable control over change, an unsettling power, especially considering, that everything in the universe was always changing. Her power was one of a formidable presence on the battlefield. In fact, she went on to do unbelievable things with it.
Vanarus got his power at level 104, Eruil at level 109, and I didn't until later on, so for a while they were the only ones with power, but even more so, even though levelling up had become slightly harder, Eruil went on to leave both of us in the dust, consumed by an unknown hunger.
At first, they called her S rank hero (101-110), then, SS rank, then, SSS rank, when she broke through that ceiling too, she went on to become the rank of legendary (level 131-140), then the title that befitted her most, heroic (141-150). At this point, the titles had become boresome, and some had hoped that she would stop at level 150.
Eruil wasn't done, though, she had gained extraordinary control over her power after level 140, but she had even surpassed that level of performance. I was at level 117, Vanarus, 121, when Eruil reached level 151. In the wake of her newfound power, unparalleled strength, and unstoppable determination, and the ranking system's failure to keep up with her, she was eventually just dubbed god!
She lived in this lamplight, until she died at level 184, at the hands of Vanarus."