As Ghislaine spoke, Shirou himself didn't react much, but the knights in the training ground showed shocked expressions.
They were clearly very surprised that Shirou had the strength of a Sword Saint. Although he hadn't received true recognition from the Holy Land of Swords, he was basically the same as a Sword Saint.
However, Shirou was only a fifteen-year-old boy.
A fifteen-year-old Sword Saint would be considered astonishing even in the Holy Land of Swords.
They seemed to witness the birth of a legend.
At the same time, Eris wasn't surprised by Shirou's strength. After all, she was Shirou's student and knew his power better than anyone.
So, she calmly accepted that Shirou had become a Sword Saint and was genuinely proud of it.
After all, Shirou was both her teacher and her brother, and his recognition was a very happy thing for Eris herself.
While everyone was reacting in different ways, Shirou looked thoughtfully at Ghislaine.
"Going to the Holy Land of Swords?"
"That's right. Anyone who has learned Sword God Style and wants to improve further must go to the Holy Land of Swords for trials."
Ghislaine looked at Shirou calmly and said, "After all, Sword God Style is still a school of sword fighting, and we must prioritize the inheritance and development of the school. Therefore, when a Sword King like me takes in students outside, once the student's strength meets the requirements, they need to go to the Holy Land of Swords to be tested. Only by passing the test can they continue to teach subsequent moves and ensure the stability of the inheritance."
"I see. So, if I want to become a Sword Saint, I need to go to the Holy Land of Swords for testing."
"Exactly."
Ghislaine nodded and said, as if to comfort him, "The test isn't difficult. At least with your current strength, Shirou, you can definitely pass it easily. However, don't be too arrogant. A fifteen-year-old Sword Saint isn't uncommon. There are even more exaggerated geniuses in the school. For example, myself and the current Sword God reached the Sword Saint level faster than you."
"I know."
Shirou nodded. He knew that his swordsmanship talent wasn't outstanding. He was able to get this far purely because of his extraordinary effort and training, plus the experience and intuition from Servant Emiya.
If he lacked any of these things, he wouldn't have become a Sword Saint at such a young age.
Now that Shirou had become a Sword Saint, he also realized how difficult this path was.
If the road to reaching Sword Saint was a rugged mountain road, where one could only reach the end with extreme caution and endless effort, then the road after Sword Saint was an indescribable chasm, an abyss that mortals could never cross in their lifetime.
Shirou was an ordinary mortal, and he knew that if he wanted to become stronger, he would need to put in more effort and sweat than ever before to go further on this path.
So, Shirou discussed with Ghislaine how to go to the Holy Land of Swords for the test.
Because Ghislaine hadn't been back to the Holy Land of Swords for a long time, she was now interested in going there.
But Ghislaine didn't leave immediately. She seemed to have some Boreas family duties to complete, and she also needed to teach Shirou some knowledge about the Holy Land of Swords, so that he could understand the situation there in advance and not be unable to adapt after arriving.
According to Ghislaine, the Holy Land of Swords is located at the far north end of the continent, in a cold environment, covered in snow all year round, a very harsh place.
The reason this place is a holy land is because it was where the first Sword God founded the style and taught his disciples swordsmanship in his later years.
It is the destination for all swordsmen, and also the starting point.
Any swordsman will visit this place.
Whether it's Sword God Style, Water God Style, or even North God Style, as long as they are confident in their swordsmanship and believe they can become strong, they will come to the Holy Land of Swords, not only to visit this place, but also because it has something that all swordsmen crave -
That is swordsmanship.
As a holy land, the Holy Land of Swords has countless marks, traces left by countless swordsmen in history during their training. Masters of swordsmanship from any style have left their marks, and by observing these marks, one can learn powerful swordsmanship from the strong from history.
Although the current manager of the Holy Land of Swords is Sword God Style, the current Sword God does not prevent other styles from visiting and learning in the holy land, and even welcomes other styles to come and compete.
Because of this, the Holy Land of Swords has become the center of the world where strong swordsmen gather.
After listening to Ghislaine's description, Shirou was undoubtedly full of longing for the Holy Land of Swords, realizing that it was undoubtedly a place where he could improve further and become stronger.
If it weren't for the distance, he would have wanted to leave for the Holy Land of Swords immediately, not only to take the Sword Saint test, but also to observe the swordsmanship of his predecessors and compete with other strong swordsmen.
Of course, Shirou also knew that things had to be done step by step.
Since he was destined to go to the Holy Land of Swords, there was no need to rush now. He should focus on doing the things in front of him first.
So, in the following time, Shirou returned to his original daily routine, practicing swordsmanship, teaching Eris swordsmanship during the day, and forging weapons and researching the magic information Roxy sent him at night.
Now that he had broken through to Sword Saint in swordsmanship, Shirou naturally couldn't make any breakthroughs in a short time.
Eris, inspired by Shirou's breakthrough to Sword Saint, also began to work harder to practice swordsmanship. Her strength was getting closer to that of an Advanced Swordsman, and her fighting spirit was more condensed than before.
But after all, her age was limited. She was still some distance away from breaking through to Advanced Swordsman, and couldn't do what Shirou did at the exaggerated age of ten.
So, during this time, the real thing worth mentioning was Shirou's forging.
After obtaining the information Roxy sent him, Shirou studied it for a long time and truly mastered several simple defensive barrier spells.
He followed the research in Roxy's letter and made the defensive barrier spells into magic circles, and found that the effect was surprisingly good.
The only problem was that Roxy's research on magic circles was average, especially on self-charging magic circles, which made it difficult to release a magic barrier directly without injecting magic power.
But Shirou was going to make Avalon, so he couldn't allow the situation where he had to inject magic power to release the defensive barrier, because it was no different from an ordinary defensive barrier spell.
Shirou realized that he should get to know a master of magic circles and figure out how to make self-charging magic circles.
Of course, before that, he still made a simplified version of Avalon.
Avalon's overall form was naturally a sword sheath, and a sword sheath that was perfectly matched with the Sword of Assured Victory. The degree of adaptation was beyond doubt.
In addition, the sword sheath itself, under Shirou's extreme forging, had incredibly exaggerated toughness, and could remain intact even in the face of a dragon's attack.
Naturally, since it was Avalon, the most important thing was undoubtedly the effect of the magic barrier.
Shirou equipped Avalon with three healing magic circles and six defensive barrier magic circles. The magic circles were connected in series. Once magic power was injected, it would immediately release a Saint-level or higher defensive magic barrier, and restore the injuries of those inside the barrier.
In the absence of a self-charging magic circle, Shirou could only choose to use magic stones as energy.
With Shirou's best efforts, the magic stone inside Avalon could support the barrier for more than half an hour, but after that, the magic stone had to be replaced to prevent the energy from running out.
Overall, Shirou was still very satisfied with the simplified version of Avalon he had forged. Only a forger of his level could forge a sword sheath in the first place, let alone engrave a Saint-level or higher defensive barrier on the sword sheath.
But even so, Shirou knew that this was just a compromise he had to make due to his limited abilities.
When his forging skills and research on magic circles improved further in the future, he would find a way to restore a more real Avalon.
At that time, Avalon would not only have at least Emperor-level, or even God-level, defensive barriers and healing magic circles, but also have the ability to merge into the user's body and protect the user from all fatal injuries.
Since Shirou had chosen to go to the extreme in forging, he had to improve the effects of the weapons he forged to the best.
In short, after getting Avalon, Shirou's Sword of Assured Victory finally had a scabbard, and he didn't have to wrap it in cloth every day.
But he didn't usually carry this overly conspicuous weapon with him, and instead hid it in his bag as much as possible.
Usually, he only wore the imitation magic sword [Wind Break] on his waist.
As time passed, the time for Shirou and Ghislaine to go to the Holy Land of Swords was getting closer and closer, and the two began to prepare.
But during this time, Shirou inexplicably felt a strange palpitation, as if some kind of danger was quietly approaching, and a strong terror seemed to be choking his throat.
Shirou didn't know what was happening at first, and thought it was just an illusion.
But one day, when he accidentally saw that the black dot in the distant sky that he had noticed before had become bigger than he had imagined, a strong intuition in his heart made him feel an unspeakable fear.
At this moment, when Shirou saw the black dot, he even thought of the Greater Grail in Fuyuki City that Emiya Shirou had witnessed, or the nuclear leak that Servant Emiya had experienced.
The Mind's Eye ability always gave him an instinctive warning when danger was triggered.
The situation was no different now.
He realized that the increasingly large black dot was very wrong, and it was something that could not be ignored.
So Shirou immediately found Sauros, the lord of the land.
Although he didn't have a good reason and couldn't just use his inner anxiety to make the other party take action, he still tried to objectively describe the strangeness of the black dot in the sky and the fact that he had to respond to it.
Sauros naturally didn't take it too seriously.
The black dot had appeared in the sky above the Fittoa Territory for several years, and many people had even become familiar with this strange thing and treated it as something commonplace.
Some extreme people even regarded it as a god of some kind of faith and set up strange religions.
In short, Sauros didn't take a special attitude towards Shirou's words, but he didn't completely ignore Shirou's words either.
So, after struggling, Sauros said that he would send someone to investigate the black sphere, at least to find out what it was.
Shirou was undoubtedly extremely dissatisfied with Sauros's reaction.
He had great trust in Servant Emiya's Mind's Eye ability, and knew that when Mind's Eye produced such vigilance, it meant that things were no longer something that an individual, or even a group of people, could change.
That must be a disaster that could not be changed by human power, an ultimate tragedy no less than the eruption of the Greater Grail or the leakage of a nuclear power plant.
Shirou, unable to do what he wanted, could only choose to do what he could to save the people around him.
He first tricked Philip and his wife into leaving Boreas Castle, under the guise of team building and relaxing, and asked them to take the servants in the castle to go on a picnic in the suburbs of Royal City.
Although Philip hesitated at first, Shirou just hinted that he could help Philip defeat James, and that all of this was just a layout for that matter. Philip immediately trusted him.
Next, Shirou also tried to trick Sauros as much as possible, asking him to take some of the citizens of Roa City to leave the city and participate in festivals in other cities.
Although it wasn't very logical, Sauros, who liked to join in the fun, surprisingly thought it made sense after hearing it, and then agreed directly.
After doing all this, Shirou also wanted to go to Buena Village.
He wanted to go back to see his long-lost family, and also to have the Greyrat family be prepared and hopefully persuade them to leave the Fittoa Territory.
Shirou had planned everything well, but he didn't expect Eris to forcibly follow him, saying that she wanted to go to Buena Village with Shirou.
Eris's temperament was quite stubborn and she made it clear that she couldn't be easily persuaded.
Even if Shirou wanted her to stay with Philip and Hilda, he couldn't persuade her. He could only reluctantly agree and embark on the journey back to Buena Village with Eris.
It is worth mentioning that Ghislaine also traveled with the two, because she had no interest in picnics, and would rather meet up and catch up with her two old friends, Paul and Zenith.
When the time came, she could also set off to the Holy Land of Swords with Shirou.
Everything seemed to be going smoothly.
But the pointer of fate had obviously begun to turn, pointing to the beginning of the next stage.
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