Ancient Rune?

"Great! This is it. How much is it in total?"

Fran herself didn't know anything about horse breeds, but she had a mastery of advanced Transmutation Studies.

In her opinion, the horse in front of her was very healthy, and theoretically could withstand several more strengthening exercises...

Of course, although she's itching to try the modifications, she'll have to wait until she enters the Antir region; performing the Transmutation Surgery within the Alliance's territory is too dangerous.

Aaron handed over a booklet from the side and then said:

"Your Excellency, these are the precautions for using this horse."

For roughnecks like knights and Mercenary, they might cherish their horses, but sometimes they just don't know how to 'cherish' them properly.

No matter what you say to him, he will probably still treat it the same way in the end.

The monks are different; they really listen to what you say. And after specializing in doing business with monks, Shane has now specially printed a bunch of booklets teaching the precautions for using horses.

"That's five Gold Coin in total... I won't take the change."

Shane chuckled and rounded down the price for Fran.

Fran used her Telekinetic Hand to take five Gold Coin from her purse. After taking them, Shane weighed them in his hand and then smiled broadly.

"Thank you, Your Excellency Mage... I'll have Aaron escort you."

Fran rode her Black Horse slowly along a road that looked like a road, but was actually quite difficult to walk on.

The roadside was overgrown with weeds, and only in the bare patches could one vaguely discern footprints and vehicle tracks.

The road surface was full of potholes, with large potholes appearing every now and then, which made it impossible for the horse to walk too fast.

Fran also wanted to examine the Short Sword she had just acquired; the runes on it greatly interested her.

She carefully stroked the engravings on the Short Sword, then slightly applied Magic Power. After the runes on it flashed, ice elements gathered on the blade.

After careful observation, Fran understood the ingenuity of the rune and why the Mercenary had said it would sometimes fail.

Most runes have a cooldown period, requiring a time to recharge after use.

This time varies from five seconds to two minutes depending on the type of rune. Some runes may become temporarily ineffective due to overuse, requiring a two-hour recharge time.

For example, the [weight] on Fran's longsword is a rune that can be activated during an attack. Once activated, it can greatly increase the weight of the sword, causing powerful damage to the opponent.

This rune has a five-second cooldown after being activated once.

Fran also added a permanent [Sturdy] rune to the longsword, making it more durable.

This rune will not be consumed when the longsword is not attacked; it will simply remain there until the longsword strikes a hard object, at which point it will take effect.

This rune will go on cooldown or be destroyed by a powerful attack if it encounters an attack exceeding its limit.

The rune before them, however, was quite different. According to Fran's observation, the rune's effect was to inflict frost damage on attacks and also had a chance to freeze the area hit.

Fran had previously considered imbuing her longsword with a similar [Frost] + [Freeze] effect.

That's right, to achieve the same effect as this Short Sword, she would need to add two runes to get a similar result.

Because gathering ice elements for attack and freezing ice elements on the opponent are two different effects, the former has a certain probability of causing the latter to occur, but the probability is very low.

Therefore, two separate runes are needed to enhance the effect.

But the Short Sword Fran had just acquired contained both of these effects in its runes, and Fran even sensed something else.

Fran intensified the injection of her Mental Power, and the runes on it began to emit a blue light.

At the same time, Fran could also sense the gathering of ice elements above, which had already surpassed the basic ice element spell [Ice Cone].

This is because Fran's Mental Power is stronger, and the Mental Power she can infuse into it is even stronger, so the effect she uses surpasses that of the Mercenary.

She felt as if there was a progress bar inside the rune, and that she could infuse it with her Mental Power to slowly fill it.

"Could this be Ancient Rune?" A thought popped into Fran's mind.

This weapon is perfect for Rune Warrior's fighting style. You need to understand runes to infuse your Mental Power into it, and you need strong Mental Power to fill this progress bar.

Fran felt that this rune was likely Ancient Rune, and the power it could display far exceeded that of the runes she had learned.

"How is it possible to gather more elements than an apprentice can gather when using only ordinary Mental Power?"

She was secretly alarmed. This was because her high Mental Power allowed her to gather so many elements, but it also meant that the rune had a very high potential.

Just then, several wolf howls came from the distant bushes, a signal that the wolf pack was gathering.

"Here we go again. Why are there so many Magic Creature outside the City of Apprentices?" Fran said, intensifying her Mental Power, displeased with the Magic Creature attacking her.

Whether it was due to too many Mercenary around the City of Apprentices or too many Magic Creature in the wilderness, Fran set off in the morning and encountered two waves of Magic Creature attacks by the afternoon.

This is the third wave, and it's all these wild wolves, all black, with little of value on them, and their flesh smells rotten.

The Black Horse beneath her moved forward slowly and steadily, knowing that its master would handle everything.

If the first two waves of attacks made it a little nervous, reminding it of being chased by these Magic Creature when it was a child, it barely managed to steady itself and tried to run away as fast as it could...

Now it was very relaxed, only glancing at the horse with its head turned to the side before continuing on its way.

The wolves ran across the grassland, making it a mess as they ran, with many blades of grass tangled together.

They did not attack immediately because they wanted to observe whether their prey was easy to deal with.

If the prey runs away at the sight of them, they will chase after it relentlessly, filling their bellies with its flesh and blood.

However, if the other party stands still and confronts them, they will have to consider whether they are hungry. If they are really hungry, they will have to attack regardless of what the other party does.

When they were ten meters away from Fran, they scattered and surrounded Fran, following the man and the horse forward.

Fran felt the progress bar was full, and the entire Short Sword emitted a faint blue light.

She casually tossed the sword at a large wolf.

The wolf nimbly dodged, letting the Short Sword embed itself in the ground. It was about to howl, hoping to use the lull in the attack to call for its companions to join the assault, when it felt the biting cold of the Short Sword sword stuck in the ground.