Having confirmed that dragon bones were the key condition to activate the Golden Finger's energy bar, Lynd couldn't help but feel fortunate that he had obtained so many dragon bones from Bowie of the Faceless Men. Otherwise, he would have had to find a way to infiltrate the Red Keep, sneak into the cellar, and steal dragon bones.
Lynd didn't rush to make a choice at this moment. He carefully analyzed the pros and cons of the Golden Finger's two options, and he found that the information provided by these two choices was too little, so little that any choice he made felt like a gamble.
For example, if he chose a new hero and mastered a new weapon, would his combat power truly increase? In his opinion, not necessarily. After all, his current dual swords, combined with the superhuman senses granted by his body, had already given him inhuman combat power. Abandoning dual swords for a new weapon would only offer limited improvement to his combat power, and might even weaken it.
As for choosing to continue improving his dual swords, he couldn't imagine what more room for improvement his dual sword techniques had. Perhaps the ultimate dual sword mastery he gained would only overlap with his current fighting style, making him waste a choice opportunity.
After careful study, he was certain that the information he received from the Golden Finger was definitely only a part of it. There must be other hidden content behind the two choices on the energy bar, and that content was the true power the Golden Finger could bestow upon him.
After much deliberation, Lynd felt like he was caught in decision paralysis. So, he stopped thinking and instinctively chose the figure holding two swords.
Although gaining a new hero's combat experience and new weapon usage methods was very tempting, he still felt that continuing to develop in the dual sword direction might be more stable. Even if the final outcome was not satisfactory, he could always make a new choice next time. For him, there was still time to accumulate energy on the bar.
Immediately after he made his choice, the energy from the energy bar poured into the figure holding two swords, and the figure began to transform rapidly. At the same time, he felt a surge of hot energy flowing into his hands, becoming more and faster. If the hot energy at first was like a small stream, now it was like a mountain torrent.
Concurrently, the dragon bones in the box turned to ash one by one in Lynd's hands, as if the last remaining power within them had been completely drawn out.
When about two-thirds of the dragon bones in the box were gone, the chosen figure holding two swords stopped changing, and its image quickly became clear.
What appeared was a very tall knight, seemingly over two meters tall, wearing exquisite full body heavy armor with mysterious runes, and a magnificent helmet. The most striking feature of the helmet was a winged dragon-shaped crest at the top.
Additionally, this knight carried two swords, but these swords were neither like Lynd's broad-bladed hand-and-a-half swords nor knightly swords. Judging by their blade length and hilt length, they looked more like two Knight's Greatswords.
Lynd couldn't even imagine using Knight's Greatswords for dual sword techniques. Even with his current strength, wielding a Knight's Greatsword with one hand was somewhat strenuous, let alone using two at once. Moreover, with full heavy armor and Knight's Greatswords, completely abandoning agile footwork, from Peacekeeper's combat experience, this was simply suicidal.
Feeling that he might have made the wrong choice, Lynd looked at the increasingly clear knight figure with some annoyance. Suddenly, he felt as if he had seen this knight somewhere before, but he couldn't recall where at the moment.
When the knight's figure became completely clear, the entire knight image transformed into a beam of light and merged into Lynd's mind. A large amount of information poured in at the same time, and Lynd's consciousness was passively drawn into it. From the outside, Lynd appeared to have fallen into a coma.
At the same time, nearly three-quarters of the remaining dragon bones in the box in Lynd's hand instantly turned to ash. The hot energy contained within the dragon bones integrated into Lynd's body, and Lynd himself became burning hot as if he were on fire.
Honor, who was lying on Lynd, obviously disliked this scorching temperature, but it did not move away from Lynd. Instead, it moved to Lynd's head and embraced Lynd's head, while Honor's body became extremely cold, like a block of ice. This indirectly helped Lynd reduce the side effects brought by the hot energy.
After about half an hour, the hot energy in Lynd's body began to subside, completely disappearing in a few minutes, and Lynd's body temperature returned to normal.
Although Lynd's height and build hadn't changed much, a closer look still revealed that his muscles had become significantly firmer, making him appear somewhat leaner.
After the hot energy subsided, Lynd emerged from the new knowledge he had gained in his mind. Upon regaining consciousness, he did not open his eyes and remained lying on the bed, but a look of pleasant surprise appeared on his face, and his breathing became heavy due to his excitement.
After calming his emotions slightly, he muttered to himself, "I didn't expect the newly acquired character to be him, the top master of Stormvail Castle."
Before this, Lynd had always thought that the Golden Finger's character scope was limited to For Honor, but now he realized that For Honor was only the basic characters of the Golden Finger. Higher levels included characters from other games on his hard drive, such as the character he now obtained, who was the Red-Eyed Dual Sword Banished Knight, known as the top master of Stormvail Castle in the game Elden Ring.
Even though his memories from his previous life were becoming increasingly blurred, Lynd still remembered his experience of being tormented by the Banished Knight in Stormvail Castle when he played Elden Ring.
Although the Red-Eyed Dual Sword Banished Knight was just a common knight, he possessed Boss-like strength. Among all mortals who used dual swords in Elden Ring, he could definitely be considered the top one.
More importantly, his dual swords were not only powerful in swordsmanship but also enchanted, and combined with his own teleportation and flickering abilities, he became the strongest Banished Knight.
This time, Lynd gained not only the character's combat experience but also the character's various training experiences and arcane knowledge. He also received complete forging blueprints for the Banished Knight's full body armor and Lost Knight's Greatsword. It could be said that all memories of a Banished Knight, except for his life memories, were instilled into him.
Undoubtedly, if Peacekeeper's swordsmanship was still at the level of mortals, then the Banished Knight's swordsmanship had truly entered the extraordinary. More importantly, Lynd discovered that he could also possess the Banished Knight's extraordinary power through the Banished Knight's training methods, and it did not require any special physique.
Through memory, Lynd learned that the extraordinary power used by the Banished Knight primarily came from two sources. One source was external, which was the Dragon Rune on the Banished Knight's full body armor and weapons.
Dragon Rune is a unique runic power of the Banished Knight order. Banished Knights engrave different Dragon Runes on their armor and weapons, allowing the Dragon Runes to constantly absorb surrounding energy to enchant the armor and weapons.
When performing corresponding swordsmanship, the runes can release the corresponding energy attached to the weapons and armor, producing effects similar to hurricanes and extreme freezing.
The ultimate strength of the effect entirely depends on the enchantment time of the Dragon Rune, meaning that the older and more complete the Banished Knight's armor and weapons, the stronger their enchanted power.
In the Banished Knight's memories, there was an instance where a Banished Knight, wearing extremely ancient armor and weapons, unleashed a freezing sword technique that directly froze an entire plain, even freezing dragons.
However, Dragon Rune is not without its flaws. This flaw is that the energy or magic absorbed and stored by Dragon Rune is not infinite. Once used up, it needs to slowly recover, just like a rechargeable battery.
Compared to the external force of Dragon Rune, the true power of the Banished Knight is actually the Dragon Communion.
The true name of the Banished Knight should actually be Dragon-Worshipping Knight. They were the earliest group of knights established due to their faith in dragons. Dragon imagery can be seen everywhere on their armor and weapons, and even the banner of the Banished Knight features a dragon-like pattern.
Because of their faith in dragons, they yearned to acquire the power of dragons, and so they invented the Dragon Rune.
Afterward, they were still not satisfied with the extraordinary power generated by this external blessing and hoped to possess the great power of dragons themselves, thus leading to the Dragon Communion.
Through the Dragon Communion, they could extract power from dragon remains to strengthen themselves, and even more so, they could unleash extraordinary powers similar to dragons. This is why the Banished Knight order could be as renowned as the Crucible Knights.
However, as the Banished Knight order was defeated and exiled to various places, some Banished Knights felt that their defeat was due to insufficient power. Therefore, they made some modifications to the Dragon Communion, directly changing the method of extracting power from dragon remains to killing dragons and then consuming their hearts to gain power.
And in the memories Lynd obtained, there was content related to performing the Dragon Communion by directly consuming dragon hearts. While this method could rapidly increase the Banished Knight's power, it also contained huge hidden dangers, the biggest of which was going mad and mutating.
In fact, the Dragon Communion itself had this side effect, but when they absorbed dragon remains, the effect of the side effect was not very significant. This might be because the power contained in the remains had been tempered by time, and all the violent aura within them had been completely worn away. Coupled with the Banished Knight's own strong will and the Dragon Rune necklace specifically designed to counter chaotic thoughts, absorption naturally posed no problem.
But directly killing a dragon and eating its heart—the power obtained this way is bound to be filled with the dragon's violent and resentful aura. Perhaps a Banished Knight could resist the influence of this violent will once or twice with their own will, but if it happens too many times, they will certainly lose control. As soon as they lose control once, their form will be completely assimilated, and the first Red-Eyed Banished Knight came into being this way.
Regardless of whether this Dragon Communion of devouring dragon hearts has side effects, and regardless of whether there are still living dragons in the Ice and Fire World, even if there are dragons and Lynd can find their lair, he would absolutely not be slaying a dragon. With his current strength, it would be more like delivering a meal to the dragon.
Instead, the normal Dragon Communion is more suitable for him, after all, there are a large number of dragon bones in the Red Keep's cellar, and now there are quite a few dragon bones in his box.
Although the power that can be enhanced by the normal Dragon Communion is far from comparable to devouring dragon hearts, it is already enough for him to roam freely in the Ice and Fire World.
It should be known that Peacekeeper's dual sword techniques had already made him powerful enough to be almost invincible in one-on-one combat, and the Banished Knight's dual sword techniques could increase his combat power by several times. Moreover, the Banished Knight's Greatsword is more suitable for mounted combat, which undoubtedly gives him an advantage in cavalry battles.
And the Dragon Communion can bestow upon him even more powerful, inhuman strength, which will undoubtedly allow him to stand more firmly in this world.
"First, let's make the armor and weapons." After organizing his thoughts, Lynd immediately had an idea.
Before the team martial arts competition, this might have been difficult. After all, a high-quality steel plate armor in Westeros was already quite expensive. Otherwise, Vortimer would not have merely lent him that plate armor. To forge a full set of heavy armor like the Banished Knight's, which was thicker than ordinary plate armor, its price could very well be ten or even more times that of plate armor.
But now, as the champion of the team martial arts competition, his prize money alone was twenty thousand gold dragons. Twenty thousand gold dragons should be enough to forge heavy armor and weapons.
As for forging materials, he naturally wouldn't dream of using Valyrian steel. This wasn't a matter of price, but rather that not much Valyrian steel has been passed down to the present day, and it has all been crafted into swords. There simply isn't any idle Valyrian steel for Lynd to use.
The material from Garlan's two swords is already sufficient. Although that steel cannot compare to Valyrian steel, it is already much stronger than ordinary steel. Once he engraves the Dragon Rune on it, the strength of this steel can undergo some unknown transformation under the influence of the Dragon Rune energy, becoming even harder.
In Lynd's memories concerning the Banished Knight, there was content about a Banished Knight cutting dragon bones with a Knight's Greatsword, and the materials used by the Banished Knight to forge armor and the Knight's Greatsword were just ordinary iron ore.
After completing the absorption and organization of the Banished Knight's memories, Lynd opened his eyes and prepared to get up, but he immediately felt a cold, heavy sensation on his head, like an ice pack was pressing down.
He reached up and grabbed Honor, who was lying on his head. He then pulled him down and held him in front of his eyes, smiling, "Why did you run to my head and lie down, you little rascal?"
Whether he understood Lynd's words or not, Honor barked a few times at him, and then he felt the cold fur on Honor's body in his hand begin to return to normal.
Although he couldn't understand what Honor was saying, judging by Honor's body becoming extremely cold and him actively lying on his head, something must have happened when he activated the Golden Finger.
At this moment, his gaze swept over the box of dragon bones next to his feet, and the situation inside the box made him pause. He then put Honor down, stood up from the bed, and vigilantly checked the situation inside the tent.
The reason he acted so alert was entirely because he noticed that a lot of the dragon bones in the box were missing. He remembered that when he activated the Golden Finger, there were still many dragon bones left in the box, but now there were only a few fist-sized dragon bones left, and the rest had all turned into bone ash.
This made him suspect whether someone had snuck into the tent and stolen some dragon bones while he was absorbing and organizing the Banished Knight's memories.
But he quickly dismissed this suspicion, because if someone had truly intruded into the tent, Honor would definitely have attacked the intruder, not to mention that there were people guarding outside the tent.
"Since no one intruded, then why are so many dragon bones missing?" Lynd felt confused and at the same time, a sudden thirst. He wanted to pick up the teapot on the table and pour himself a cup of water, but when he picked up the cup, he squeezed it slightly, and the oak cup immediately shattered as if it were made of paper.